Hoops

36ers vs Breakers, Jan 8

When do school holidays end?

That reminds me - on an inbound play when we got close to a 5 second call (2nd or 3rd qtr), Marty had Brad tied up speaking to him from the sidelines in the back court for the first 3 seconds as we couldn't find a player to hit with the pass!

Isaac - 'We' as a club, regardless of ownership. Might be a symptom of the league overall - just the feeling I've had for a few years.

Re: the quote, I read it as "We've trained right - I can't physically make the guys translate intensity and desire to the floor on game night". But yes, it strikes me as a swipe at the roster.

Does anyone else feel like we're horrible at training big guys?

Wheels for example only became a rounded player once he landed in Goorjan's system. We just don't seem to develop guys to play at 5 (traditionally).

Or we land naturally talented ones and they defect after stints in Europe *shakes fist*

Not much to add that hasn't already been said. I've not really chimed in on the Hill thing, but Big Ads is correct - I don't see him as a starter; the consistency just isn't there.

Flashes in the fourth were great, but have a look at his percentages from the first three quarters - horrendous. He essentially had a three and two lay-ups in the burst that got us back. Great stuff - but in the context of the whole game, not enough to warrant first 5 IMO.

Re: lack of a genuine center, I've been screaming all year for DJ to start - whatever it takes to gets Balls to the 4 spot. It's killing us.

Bretts, what I was saying above was that Marty did setup some opportunities for Howard to get involved, but he failed to seize them. As a result, he lost confidence and his team mates looked to other players to score.

He also has a problem starting atm, because there aren't naturally a lot of shots for him. He is the same player as Hill, so he is going to be looking for similar spots on the floor to score from, but Hill knows the team system better and has more confidence right now, so he is probably taking away some opportunities for Howard (not having a go at Hill btw people).

Combine that with the fact that Balls and Shannon are going to get their share of shots and there aren't a lot of opps for Howard with the starters. Hence, he is going to end up standing around in the corner, somewhat peripheral to the offence at times.

His skills might be better utilised off the bench when Hill isn't on and there is less scoring power on the court.

He'd also benefit a lot, I think, if the Sixers played that more aggressive, trapping defence we've seen at times. If we can create some turnovers, he'd get a lot more chances to score on the break.

Very Old, agree with you about Balls needing to go outside and draw guys like Pledger away from the basket. Exactly what Wilkinson did to Balls so successfully on Saturday! Problem for the Sixers was that Pledger didn't play all that long.

Isaac, I thought that Shannon seemed a little passive at times, but a lot of that had to do with the pressure NZ put on him throughout the game. They kept hounding him up the floor, so he didn't have much of a chance to find a lane to the basket, or to pull up for that money three of his. The way out of it is for our bigs to help him out by setting some good screens around mid-court. Lay a couple of bone jarring screens and not only does it shake the opposing guard up, Shannon would be freed up and playing 4 on 4 for a few seconds, which is all he'd need to create something I reckon.

I hope Marty has been drilling his team all week on how to set screens and how to box out! Get those two things right and I think we'll start seeing better results again.

I think you have it wrong if you are blaming the coach for Howard's woes. In the first quarter, Marty had clearly directed his team to put the ball in Howard's hands early to see if he could create and get himself going. Guess what? Zippo. Howard couldn't beat his man off the dribble. Didn't do it once. So that offensive option is out for Howard.

Then I noticed they were running a play for Howard where he curls around a screen on the left wing a bit inside the 3 point line. That didn't work either, but I reckon that might not have been so much his fault. A couple of times, the Breakers defender just plowed through the screener (might have been DJ?) and shoved Howard and so he either wasn't passed the ball or he fumbled it and missed his opp to get to the basket.

Thats down to our guys setting up crap screens and/or ridiculous NBL referees, who don't seem to know what illegal screens are, or that you can't just run straight through a legal one!

So I don't blame the coach for Howard's woes. I blame Howard's limitations and the seeming inability of our guys to set decent screens at the moment. They were doing it better less than two weeks ago when we beat the Hawks FFS!

Our guys need to get a bit of mongrel in them too. If someone tries to plow through you when you set a screen, they need an elbow to the head or guts. Lay them out and send a message. We're too soft half the time. Get Paul Rees to talk to them!

As I recall , Clarke said he'd be very handy, against Melbourne.
I imagine, with Ng and Carter fit, if they make a move on Howard, they'd consider signing Bruce and Harris, who have played on injury waivers and are training well here.

I'm not exactly sure that people will remember these players, but Marty will, Ballinger actually plays like Dave Nelson ( all star centre NBL first season - cannons and bullets) did, a player who began as a banging centre but developed into a player with too much range out at the 3 line for a 4 or 5 man to guard , but too strong inside and mid-range for a 3 to keep tabs on. Plus Nelson actually had plays run for him that gave him the long 3 at the point. Does not seem to be even looked up here. So Ballinger has to guard Pledger ( who actually played V well ! and was effective I thought ) who is simply too big for Ball to guard under the ring, and when pledger was on him, we never ran ball out to the 3 - WTF !!.

I wonder if Marty ( as an ex-guard) just does not get the fact that for some tall guys, providing height is actually enough for the team to provide difficulty for the other team, provided that they have some ability and have good spot up shooters to feed. That was the difference between tall beanpoles like Andy Cambell and Peter Walsh, Cambell had players like Smyth and Kennedy to feed back outside, just like Ballinger could have Ng , Walsh had no one shoting from outside in the melboune and boomers system under gaze..

The Ais mens program did not produce experienced centres like Bogut and Longley, they got developed in the US. the AIS system ( at least at that time) focuses upon overall basketball skill, not specialist 4/5 man skills like, say Pete newell or Rick majerus did .

I really hope that we get a real 5 into the team and stop P!!ssing arrounf with all these flocks of adequate but not exceptional 2s and 3s.

Agreed about our intensity. I've said this before, but with the roster decisions we made and with the way we played the first game against Perth, I thought we were going to be an in your face, harass them all the way up the floor team this season. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, we play with that kind of intensity all too rarely.

We showed that with a bit of pressure we can get turnovers in the last quarter and then all of a sudden, surprise surprise, Balls is getting easy post ups in the key over Wilkinson, who CANNOT guard him that close to the basket.

The way we played in the last 5 mins is how we should be starting games!

Injuries and late roster introductions to the Sixers compared to largely the same team from late last season bar wilkinson for the Breakers is a fair bit of the difference between the two teams. Breakers roster is deep and players no longer need to play big minutes as mentioned earlier in this thread, players conditioning and fitness will improve through the season and chance of injury is greatly reduced meaning they will hopefully be playing strongly in the playoffs (fingers crossed they make it of course) when other teams have injury fatigue issues.

Does anyone know where Boti is? absent in the paper yesterday and seemingly a no show at the game.

Breakers said they were gonna concentrate on getting the rebounds and it looked like it worked. Didn't see or listen to the game so quite stoked to wake up to a win.

Gotta give some credit to the Breakers defence tonight, they did a great job of getting the ball out of Shannon's hands and gave him virtually nothing.

But as far as our team goes it was disgraceful. We have no steel in us - when our opponent is playing well, we just don't seem to understand how to fight back and regain control.

Hill, good effort trying to drag us back into it in the 4th, but we were never going to reel that deficit in, because our guys are once again back to playing clueless offence most of the time.

Does anyone on our team know how to set a screen properly to get the ball-handler free? Our guards just had nothing to create with. Everyone was either standing around or setting crap screens that achieved nothing.

Oh and one more thing: BOX THE F&%# OUT!

Too pissed off to say more. Thought we'd bounce back tonight. Instead, it felt like I was watching last years rabble of a team again. So disappointed.

Creek - 7 minutes and 5 fouls. Quite unlucky on at least 2 calls I thought.

and a little bit of Harris would be handy, but I've mentioned that before.

How is it that Wilkinson was allowed to post so many easy baskets? Is Ballinger on summer holidays?
Brad Hill unlucky to get a few fouls which utlimately saw us lose but when you have a quarter where you score only 7, to the Breakers 25 or so, there is the game.
One interesting point to make, how long were NZ allowed more than 3 seconds inside the key on more than one occassion. On one play I counted Wilkinson inside for 7 seconds and yet, game continued. Seriously, the only time the refs count seconds is coming out of defence which is really poor.
To those who had a dig at Bruce, hey...when Carter does it along with Hill, they are treated like gods. Everyone has game fades and brain fades. Ballinger had it last week with Greer yet was halo(ed) for his stand up performance.
Lastly, to the woman in front who indeed was a SACA member, just remember this isnt a game like cricket where you recieve scones and jam at each interval. Its basketball which means people support their team. Next time, come back with the same attitude instead of giving attitude towards myself and fellow supporters who want to see the team do well. If you cant follow that rule, then dont go. We werent abusive like you said on more than one occassion!

Well that's the thing.. on that other thread re Clarke wants more flexibilty with the roster..
Bruce can only replace Carter on injury waivers..
Not Ng , as well
Too many Johnsons.. this one might swing.
Only saw a little bit of him..

X, I agree with you that the some of the Breakers lineup is a bit out of shape.
However, when you have a lineup that deep, you dont have to have the fittest team in the league as guys are only required to play 'short, hard' bursts. CJ, Webster, Braswell and Henare are all interchangable. Take one guy out and you can put him in with a guy just as effective.

Difference is the Blaze players are required to play big minutes...Wortho obviously is their marquee player, Goulding plays significant minutes and Gibson plays huge minutes hence their fitness issues are going to be more noticeable/amplified.

Camel, I'm guessing Bruce may be able to cover the loss of Ng which allows Carter to swing to a shooting guard role.

Are you sure we need KJ, too many guards as it is ;-)

That was our lowest 3rd qtr score ever.
Bruce had a go, but has to leave us , if Carter comes back (injury weavers thingy)
Not sure what to do about Howard. Maybe Kevin Johnson instead (seeing he's here training)

yeh im with x. Anons are smoking too much crack. Sixer fans are more disappointed with the performance of the team. If everyone was bagging refs then yes but we are shitty about the dumb shots and passes that were missed. So i agree anons are wankers at the moment but whats new

Issac you have got to do something about Anonymous posters please.

New Zealand were what you would expect from a team sitting in top spot. They made the big plays when they were needed (Ambercrombie's block on that attempted Hill lay-up was exceptional!)and were patient on offense. They made silly mistakes but they also did what was needed so they didn't lose the game.

Interesting comment about fitness but there is still plenty of time for that to fall into place over the next 3 months. I think they simply went into cruise mode because they were on the road. Different story had it been North Shore stadium I suspect (see sixers v Melbourne game). I have little doubt they will miss finals even if they were placed on a heavy training program.

Dunkin Dan's comment about Howard is the same question I would like answered and from the coach...What is his role?

He starts but hardly sees the ball or much court time after he is subbed out. When he does get the ball he has to create a shot for himself which does not appear to be a strength of his game. He does not appear to be the slasher/finisher type of player that this team desperately needs. Winder provided the team more but no point going down that line of discussion.

Surprising final quarter from Hill, especially with his defense. He displayed that potential again, but he is not starter quality, a respectable bench man (as Loco would correctly suggest) at best and I doubt likely to be much more. In fact I also put Holmes and Ng in the same category (shame about Ng's injury, I'm giving an uneducated guess that it either ligament damage to the ankle or broken fibia or tibia bone).

I've never been a great x&o's man but I don't understand what the point is to the offense other than to hit the open man in the corner. Shannon's creativity looks so stifled that he contributes little when running the offense.

Well I've concluded that the rest of the season should be about giving Creek, Johnson, Bruce, Daly & Dowdell more responsibility and see if they can command starter spots. Don't see much point retaining Howard in his current role. This season has now become (for me) pre, pre-season for next year and any wins will be a pleasant surprise.

Ultimately if we played with the same pressure D the whole game as we did in the last Q we would have been OK. Our full court defence or on ball defence up the court was pointless, might have well just ran back and set it up and let them walk it down.

Shannon needs to work harder to get the ball when were inbounding baseline.

SUBS etc were all over the shop and we had no balanc etc. it is also possible to play balls, holmes and DJ or Dowdell all at once and hopefully grab a board.

Making our free throws would have also helped.

The 3rd qtr u only had a record low 6 pts. That would have been hard to watch!

i swear if i hear marty clarke going on about trying to make a finals run he is smoking some good stuff. after that shocking display they have a tonne of work to do. never been so disappointed. Its not that howard is a bad player its more so that they dont seem to be including howard in many of the plays. he seems to be a good player but marty isnt using him to his best ability from my point of view.

Absolutely terrible game.

Just saw the final score. 90 - 85

Left the game at the end of the 3rd quarter. Not regretting leaving either despite the final margin. Basically showed that there was no defence by either team in that 4th period.

If the Sixers had actually played a decent game, that 17pt collapse the Breakers took in the 4th would have resulted in a 20pt win.

Very disappointed in Clarke now. What the hell is he running the team through? sure as hell isn't anything basketball related.

Go Breakers!!!

Ron Howard. What is his purpose?

Here comes more of those freebies, after getting the yips at the start of quarter.

We've got 17 boards to your 14....... ON YOUR GLASS!!!!!!

61-45 Now you are in a world of hurt. Catchup can get desperate!!!

9 TO's and giving up 13 Offensive rebounds is why Breakers are up 8 even though we are not shooting ball well. When Penney gets going in 2nd half, not sure if Sixers will have any answers.
We have managed to keep Shannon from breaking loose. Howard seems quiet.
You will need big effort from those two just to stay close.

Up 8, 1.50 to go in half. We can really put the squeeze on here.

Pressures on, looks like we are getting on top. Sixers need to hang on.

All your TO's Sixers should be up 10. When we connect on a few 3's we should take control of this one.

All those freebies we're getting are money for jam.

So far looking good, up 23-20 witl Ballinger on fire.

ABC radio sometimes cover 36ers games on Saturdays
But , I think they are at the cricket , instead.

TV news, radio didn't talk about it all that much
or the loss in Melbourne. More about the win v the Hawks.
IF we were going for 3 wins in a row it would be publicized and written about.

Teams match up well. Depends who shoots the 3-ball best and who gets to the line for freebies.
Both teams only pretend to have an inside game so it comes down to shooting % and TO's.
If 36ers play that sick zone we will blow them out. Toughen up and make a game of it.