NBL Wrap Round 18: McPeake gets a taste of his own medicine

It was the game everyone wanted to watch but unless you were a resident of New Zealand it was the game you were unable to see. As is often the case at North Shore the New Zealand Breakers got off to an electric start, Alex Pledger dunking it with part time air commander and Justin Bieber look-a-like Thomas Abercrombie. It wasn’t until the second quarter the Wildcats, led by Kevin Lisch were able to mount a resurgence and went into the main change with a two point lead.

 Historically the Wildcats have always appeared to struggle in the third quarter and this game was no exception, the Wildcats adding a lethargic 10 points to their tally whilst the Breakers put the game out of reach scoring 24 points for the quarter. The Wildcats attempt to play catch up basketball was stymied by the New Zealand shooters, the Kiwis running out for a 6 point victory. Though the Breakers walk away with the win  they did learn the level of effort that is required for aspects of the game other than scoring. The Breakers were out-rebounded, scored less second chance points and committed five more turnovers than the Cats. Should their shot not drop the Breakers seem to struggle and need to look for ways to keep in and win games.

It was the Breakers red hot shooting percentage that got them over the line.  Gary Wilkinson was ‘red’ hot with 18 points but managed only 3 rebounds. Cedric Jackson went for 15 and 10 but was frustrated with Damian Martin’s defence coughing up the ball on five occasions, CJ Bruton went 4/5 from the land of plenty on his way to 14 points but managed little else and Mika Vukona was his usual self

Jesse Wagstaff who has been in red hot form lately finished with a dismal 1/12 from outside whilst Damian  Martin was everywhere and finished with 6 points, 9 rebounds, 7 assists, 2 steals and 3 blocked shots. Kevin Lisch lead the scoring charge with 20 points whilst Shawn Redhage scored 15 and Luke Nevill had 14.

In Far North Queensland this is the only battle that matters, the winners gets to put their thumbs on their ears and poke their tongue out at the losers, not only as a team but as a community.

In an intense game, with his team leading by a point at the last change Jamar Wilson kicked it up a gear and scored 14 fourth quarter points to give his side not only city bragging rights but a four point victory. With the energy of the Energizer Bunny, Wilson sped the court with an array of fast breaks and finished with 18 points, six boards, and 4 assists. Andrew Warren scored a game high 24 points but added little else, Alex Loughton scored 16 points and hauled in 8 rebounds and Andrew Crosswhite grabbed 7 boards and dished out 8 tasty assists.

Eddie Gill’s season has been patchy but his efforts were enough to see him score a team high 17 points. Luke Schenscher added 16 points but his 2 rebounds (both offensive) are frankly not good enough for a starting centre that played 32 minutes, even worse for a centre with at least 3 inches on the tallest player on the other team’s roster. Jacob Holmes did the bulk of the rebounding duties pulling in 10 and Todd Blanchfield added 13 points.

As mentioned earlier, this game was decided on fourth quarter energy and the Crocs had no answer to Wilson. Jamar sliced and diced any defensive effort from the Crocs. Maybe worse was Townsville’s dismal effort from inside the three point arc in the final quarter going 2/6 from inside, instead opting to put up twice as many three pointers going 5/12 from outside for the quarter. IT was enough to keep them in the game but not enough to get over the line.

To describe this game we believe a recent comment from NBA Finals MVP Dirk Nowitzki of the Dallas Mavericks sums it up best, while injured he provided colour commentary for a game when he came up with the gem “Shut it down, let’s go home!!”

This is what must have been on the minds of Hawks players during this game as the lead kept growing and growing.

Now we understand the Blaze are a potent offensive team, but a 41 point scoreline margin is not something any professional player with an ounce of competitive spirit would concede to, now we aren’t saying the Hawks gave up and just were there to make up the numbers, but it sure looked like it.

When you have only 2, yes 2 players on a professional basketball team score in double digits for a game, how can you expect to even possibly be seen as competitive, shooting 30% from the field and just 11% from beyond the 3pt line against a team not renowned for its defence, something has just gone horribly wrong.

Only Ayinde Ubaka and………………wait for it…………….Tim Coenraad scored in double figures, Ubaka with 12pts 5reb 2ast and 5 turnovers and Coenraad 10pts 3reb were even worth a mention for providing any fight at all, Oscar Forman, Larry Davidson, Glen Saville, the call for help was sent out but everybody seemed to have their voicemail on.

Just as we thought the Hawks were on their way back to redeeming their dignity for the season, they slip back into mediocrity, and for that we are disappointed.

The Blaze would have come out of this game with more swagger than they’ve ever had after dishing out a monumental butt kicking of this magnitude, but the question is, should they be crowing like an early morning rooster after such a hollow victory?

Sure we saw the return to form of our old mate Wortho with 25pts 5reb, some decent production from youngster Jason Cadee with 12pts 7ast and no turnovers and what seems to be a return to his old production level from Anthony Petrie with his 11pts 8reb, but is this production to be happy about if you were Coach Joey Wright.

Holding the Hawks to just 50pts is not the sign of great defence, it’s a sign of really bad offence, the Hawks are a better team than their performance on this night and the Blaze just caught them with their pants down.

Adris Deleon and Adam Gibson had similar stat nights, both players had 13pts, Gibson also had 5reb 4ast and Deleon with 6reb.

This game if you’re a Hawks fan will hopefully find some way of being stripped from all records of existence, if you’re a Blaze fan, it’s something to be happy about until the old Blaze we know and love come back, the one where you flip a coin on any given night to find out if they are the team everyone thinks they are or if they just suck on any given night.

This game was the last of the round and a game where the 36ers hoped they could turn their fortunes around, it was a matchup of big men in Daniel Johnson and Luke Schenscher, point guards Chris Warren and Eddie Gill and 2 teams with different agendas, one trying to show some resilience and one trying to stay close to the playoff race.

The 36ers unfortunately couldn’t rally enough to get the win, but they did mostly control the game for the first half lead by Mitch Creek, who after is absence in the previous game decided it was time to stand up and be counted, Creek had a team high 19pts to go with his 5 reb. Steven Weigh kept his current productivity level going with another 13pts and 6reb and Diamon Simpson had a lower than usual production of 10pts 5reb.

The lack of showing from Daniel Johnson in this game and his battle with Luke Schenscher proved to be the deciding battle, Big Luke getting the better of the up and coming youngster in this game, Johnson struggling all night after his great performance earlier in the round with only 6pts and 4reb in this game.

The Crocs started slow but finally fired up during the game lead by Schenscher who finished with 22pts 7reb and dominated Johnson and any other player matched up on him all night. The Crocs had good outputs from multiple players on this night with 6 players including Big Luke scoring in double figures, this more rounded offensive production helped the Crocs solidify the win and keep them in the hunt for the playoffs.

Elvin Mims and the Cedar boys all had 11pts, Peter Crawford with 10pts and Eddie Gill with 16 rounded out the scorers, to go with this balanced offensive production the Crocs also rebounded well as a team and smashed the 36ers on the boards 41 – 28, the Crocs had 26 defensive rebounds alone to the 36ers 28 total rebounds, and as they say, the game is won on the boards.

So the Crocs stay alive in the race while the 36ers just look like a total disgrace, and even though we try to refrain from rhyming, you have to admit we have great timing.

We hate to do it but we have to give this week’s award to the Hawks for their dismal showing against the Blaze.

As stated in our game wrap earlier, the Hawks had 2 players in double figures, shot 30% from the field and just 11% from beyond the 3pt line.

Now we here believe in occasionally rooting for the underdog small market team, but this effort proved they need more than just our good will, they need good players, or players that at least decide to turn up for a gem rather than just  mailing it in.

So unfortunately for the Hawks, you get our award this week for an abhorrent showing, but we do hope you can rally and come back from this loss with an increased desire to prove you are a better team than what you showed this round.

It is no secret that Organisational culture starts from the top down. The Melbourne Tigers have had a rough time trying to develop a good organisational culture in recent years, a few weeks back it was CEO Seamus McPeake storming in to the locker room after the game and immediately parting ways with Ayinde Ubaka and a season ago import guard Eric Devendorf and head coach Al Westover were shown the door in similar fashion.

The Melbourne Tigers announced this week that  they gave the angry fireball Seamus McPeake a taste of his own medicine, er…. we mean, will step aside as CEO of the club and Dodo director Michael Slepoy has  been appointed as the new CEO.

Now, if this is a smokescreen to try to divert the negative attention McPeake and his antics have bought in recent weeks then things aren’t going to change and as we understand McPeake still owns part (if not majority) of the club so in a sense McPeake could still storm the locker room as owner  and demand firings or start squeezing the pennies; but if this is the Tiger’s way of moving McPeake out of day to day operations of the club then the Tigers can attempt to rebuild their organisational culture in a more positive way and that is a good thing, right?