What makes Bryce "20 per cent better" than any other player

The Hungry Jack's NBL26 season might only be five rounds old, but the case for another MVP award for Bryce Cotton is already gaining momentum.

The five-time recipient of the award was dominant in both of Adelaide's Round 5 wins, over South East Melbourne and Cairns.

In particular, Cotton exploded for 53 points (on 16/29 from the field) in the win over the Taipans, marking his second-highest score in his NBL career.

The impressive nature of this game and his overall season to date, where he is averaging a career-high 30.7 points, 6 assists and 2.3 steals per game, has seen NBL legend Derek Rucker say that the three-time NBL champion is 20 per cent better than anyone in this competition.

"Cairns have to ban Bryce Cotton from far north Queensland because he's just been torching these guys every time he goes up there. He gave them 53 and it was in all sorts of entertaining fashion," Rucker said on Monday's episode of NBL Now.

"He's knocking down jumpers. He was getting to the rack. He was doing it in transition, but sometimes the Cairns Taipans assisted him by just playing poor defence and not using the proper pick and roll coverage.

"You cannot play drops against Bryce Cotton. In fact, I'm not even sure you can use any form of showing. Hard show, soft show, hedging. No, there's only one way to attack this.

"If you're allowing Bryce to play one-on-one basketball, let's understand this. At his best, he is 20 per cent better than everybody else in the competition.

"When he gets it going like that, you have absolutely no chance of stopping him with one man. You've got to send two.

"At times, I saw three men rush to the basketball, but it was too late. He already had 40-plus at that point.

"You must take the ball out of his hands if you want to have a chance at winning basketball games."

Cotton and his 36ers travel to Melbourne on Sunday for a blockbuster Indigenous Round clash with the undefeated United at John Cain Arena.

The top two battle tips off at 2.30pm AEDT, live on ESPN and Channel 10.