R18 Preview: Cairns Taipans v Perth Wildcats

When: 7.30pm (AEST), Monday 17 May

Where: Cairns Pop-Up Arena

Broadcast: ESPN; Sky Sports NZ; SBS On Demand; Twitch

The last time
Perth 93 (Cotton 28, Mooney 21, Blanchfield 17) d Cairns 75 (Machado 16, Noi 14, Jawai 13) – Round 10, RAC Arena, Perth

It was now two months ago when the teams last met and that was the last game after the NBL Cup, and Cairns made the trip to Perth but the Wildcats came away with the 18-point victory on the back of a combined 49 points from Bryce Cotton and John Mooney.

The 'Cats came out on fire and Cotton took seven three-point attempts in the first quarter alone trying to make a statement. By late in the first term they led by 14 points, that grew to 20 shortly before half-time and from there the Taipans never got it back closer than 13.

Cairns did fight the game out but Perth was never in any real jeopardy at any point with Cotton delivering another 28 points and five assists while going 6/16 from deep.

Mooney was tremendous again with 21 points, eight rebounds and three assists while going an efficient 7/8 from the floor with Blanchfield contributing 17 points, five rebounds and two steals.

While Scott Machado had 16 points and four rebounds, he was without an assist for the second time in his NBL career. Kouat Noi had 14 points, nine rebounds, three assists and two steals, but 12 of his points came in the opening half.

Cam Oliver had just six points on 3/10 shooting, Mirko Djeric seven points on 3/10 shooting and Fabijan Krslovic fouled out in less than seven minutes. Next Star Mojave King was also scoreless on four shot attempts in 12 minutes.

Nate Jawai was a bright spark in the second half and finished with 13 points and five rebounds while Jordan Ngatai battled hard for 10 points.

 

The now

Coming into Monday's game to close Round 18 of the #NBL21 season the Wildcats might be still in a fight for top spot with the Taipans playing for nothing but pride, but performing better for themselves and their home fans should be plenty of motivation for the Snakes.

The Wildcats and Taipans had some cracking battles going back to last season culminating in their semi-final match up that went to three enthralling matches with the 'Cats only just managing to prevail with Game 3 in Perth on their way to making it back-to-back championships.

Now the Wildcats are right in the mix to chase the club's first ever championship three-peat but the season hasn’t gone to plan for the Taipans as they currently sit in bottom place and are now on a four-game losing skid.

Cairns comes into the game on Monday which will be their second last one at the Pop-Up Arena in front of the Orange Army for #NBL21 after a disappointing 29-point loss in Melbourne against the South East Melbourne Phoenix back on Friday night. Prior to that they had lost at home also to the Phoenix and Brisbane Bullets along with away to the Adelaide 36ers.

The last win for the Snakes was in Tasmania against the New Zealand and their last win over Perth back in Game 2 of the semi-final series last year at the Convention Centre.

At 7-22, obviously there isn’t a post-season for the Taipans to still be shooting for but taking pride in performance for yourself and your club, and indeed your supporters should count for a lot not to mention players are playing for their careers now to close out the season. That should all add up to the Snakes finding plenty of motivation for Monday's clash.

Quite simply, if the Wildcats still want to have a hope of grabbing top spot off Melbourne United, they can't drop this game. The 'Cats did lose at home to Melbourne back on Thursday night, but bounced back strongly in Brisbane on Saturday to start their run of three games in five days in Queensland.

Perth comes into Monday's game in Cairns on a 21-8 record to be just behind Melbourne who are now 21-7. A win for the Wildcats on Monday and the race for top spot is well and truly on and a loss at the same time, could leave them likely having to settle for second position.

Monday's game will also be the first time that Cairns have taken on the Wildcats minus Cam Oliver and with Venky Jois in the line-up, while it's also the first time the Snakes get a look at the 'Cats with Will Magnay having further strengthened their squad.

 

The stats

- The Wildcats are coming off the highest-scoring fourth quarter of any time this season on Saturday when they scored 41 points against Brisbane. Todd Blanchfield had 15 points, Mitch Norton 11 and Bryce Cotton 11 as they shot 12/15 from the field, 7/7 from three-point range and 10/12 at the foul line.

- In the five games for Cairns since the departure of Cam Oliver they have been averaging just 75.2 points a game and shooting 41.3 per cent from the field and 30.3 per cent from downtown. Meanwhile their opposition is putting up 89.6 points and shooting 47.3 per cent field goals and 34.4 per cent three-pointers.

- Scott Machado needs to lift for the Taipans to be a chance of the victory. In the opening 14 rounds of the season he was putting up 17.0 points and 7.3 assists a game which has fallen to 8.8 points and 5.4 the last five games. His shooting is also off, down from 36.6 per cent from beyond the arc to 15.

 

The key men

Nate Jawai – He continues to be the one player who can be a dominant figure for the Taipans and that the opposition have very little chance of being able to stop. If he is aggressive and catching the ball down low in the right spot, and his teammates are feeding him, then he can dominate against Perth as well as anyone. The added benefit could be getting John Mooney and Will Magnay in foul trouble as well. So if Cairns want a sniff, feed the big man in the post because right now he's healthy, motivated and hungry to show what he can still do.

Todd Blanchfield – He is fresh off his best game as a Wildcat with 31 points in Saturday's win against the Brisbane Bullets as he prepares to return to Far North Queensland. He used to thrive on Reptile Rumbles when playing at the Crocodiles so will look to enjoy this return to Cairns, and he is a real barometer for the Wildcats this season. While Bryce Cotton and John Mooney have been consistently brilliant, he is averaging 15.0 points and 3.9 rebounds in wins this season while shooting the three ball at 38.4 per cent. In losses he is putting up 13.9 points and 3.2 rebounds while shooting from downtown at 29.8 per cent.

The quotes

Taipans coach Mike Kelly was left flabbergasted with the way the last three quarters panned out on Friday night against the South East Melbourne Phoenix.

"I'm still trying to figure out what happened in this game. It's disappointing and South East Melbourne came out with great energy for the last three quarters and ran over top of us," Kelly said.

"We didn’t give them a lot of fight defensively and it's a little bit frustrating. There was no indication that we'd come out and play like that in the last three quarters especially."

Given Kelly has already been giving everyone in the Taipans squad plenty of opportunities, he's not necessarily there's an easy answer of what can be done differently, it's all about how the players come out and perform and what mindset they have.

"Everybody played in this game and Jarrod Kenny with four minutes and Fab with eight minutes played the least so I'm not sure what changes we can make in terms of giving guys more opportunity," Kelly said.

"But we'll try and figure it out. It's simple, you have to be mentally tough and physically tough, and in this game we weren’t that."

There might have been hard lessons again learned Friday night against the Phoenix, but that's nothing new for the Taipans this season. All Kelly now asks of his group starting Monday against the Wildcats is they go out and give their all, and leave nothing on the court.

"I think all year there's been some hard lessons. We've been through ups and downs in Cairns over the last three years and all that we preach, and all that the people of Cairns care about is if these guys go out and play as hard as they can," Kelly said. 

"That's the first and foremost thing so that's what we will focus on. We've got some good players in this group and guys that can win basketball games in the NBL so we need to put that effort out there, and show that never say die attitude out on the floor every night so that we deserve to be there."

Wildcats coach Trevor Gleeson isn’t too worried if his team is guaranteed of a 35th consecutive finals appearance or not, all he wants to do is continue to get them playing as well as a group as he can.

"I don’t know if we're locked in yet mathematically, I thought 22 wins would guarantee it and I think we're on 21 at the moment. We just want to get into a good rhythm with each other and I was really happy in the last game with Todd who was outstanding and we were able to find him with the ball," Gleeson said.

"Will still has to integrate to what we're doing and that's just going to be a process in the last month, and he's improved from every game. Then you've got your workhorses with Bryce and John. If I'm being picky I'd probably look for a little bit more from the bench and get them a bit more involved, and hopefully we can do that over the next month."

Working Will Magnay into the system for the 'Cats and developing his partnership with fellow big John Mooney remains an on-going focus for Gleeson, but it's not easy with no practice time.

"We can't even practice either at the moment with travel, game, travel, game, travel, game. So we are learning on the court as we go and a week ago Will was just out of quarantine so he's taking gradual steps," Gleeson said. 

"Hopefully he is fine by the start of June. We probably got about what we wanted into him in that last game and we just gave him a few shorter stints after he started to gas. I was happy we could get 15 minutes into him."

The Wildcats will be playing their third game in five days when they take on the Taipans in Cairns on Monday, and coach Gleeson might like to give a few extra minutes to some bench players and a few less to his stars, but he won't be flirting with form too much at all.

"There's a few bodies banged up already and I know Bryce was getting some treatment straight after the Brisbane game. But it's good to see the Queensland boys play better when they get back to Queensland with Mitch and Vinnie having big games," Gleeson said.

"We got off the plane and they were all smiling and thought the air was a lot cleaner up this way. We'll just rotate the 11 guys we suit up and we don’t want to screw around with the team. In basketball rhythm and chemistry is a big part, and I think you've seen a couple of teams in the past get out of rhythm at the wrong time. 

"We want to stay in rhythm and the lead into the playoffs is very important, and we don’t want to screw around with that. We want to play a good style of basketball but also give four, five or six minutes to the bench guys to get into the swing of things as well."

Perth point guard Mitch Norton had a tremendous game on Saturday in Brisbane as he now prepares for what is as close to a homecoming as he can get in the NBL now with the Crocs no longer in existence.

The former Townsville captain is just looking forward to the Wildcats continuing to build into the finals.

"We are always just focused on one goal and we turn up to training, and have the right attitude, and when you have a whole group of guys buying in and turning up ready to go it's a fun environment to be in. We're looking forward to the rest of the season now," Norton said.

"It's definitely exciting having those two on the floor at the same time. It's tough not getting that practice time in but Shootarounds have been pretty important for us to get through certain things, and to try and catch him up to speed as much as he can. 

"But he's a great kid and is intelligent, and wants to do everything he can for the team first. We are very excited to have him and it won't be too long until we see him back in the swing of things."