Sobey Lights It Up, Bullets Hammer Hawks

Nathan Sobey sent a reminder that his best is still among the elite of the NBL as he torched the Illawarra Hawks in a stunning early outburst as the Brisbane Bullets made it back-to-back wins, prevailing 86-61.

Ever since he was part of Australia's bronze medal winning team in Tokyo, Sobey has struggled with a knee complaint that ended his NBL22 campaign early, and has made it slow progress for him early in NBL23.

However, the superstar combo guard has been building and it all came together on Thursday night at Nissan Arena with the Bullets backing up their breakthrough first win of the season in the 'Gong against the same opposition on Monday.

Sobey knocked down his first four three-point attempts in a remarkable shooting display for his best ever quarter in the NBL.

He had 14 points in the first term, 22 in the first half and while he didn’t add to that, he didn’t need to with Brisbane thumping Illawarra by 25 after winning by 26 on Monday after the 0-5 start.

It was the Bullets' first home win of the season on the back of shooting 41 per cent to 30 from the Hawks, pulling down 55 rebounds to 42 and having six players scoring at least eight points.

Jason Cadee put up 13 points, four rebounds and four assists with Harry Froling adding 13 points and 10 rebounds, Aron Baynes nine points and 14 boards, and Tanner Krebs eight points and five rebounds.

Anything but benched, Tyler Johnson continued to do well in the role he's accustomed to as a sixth man with another 11 points, three rebounds, three steals and two assists while taking nine free-throws.

Bullets coach James Duncan was especially happy his team was able to back up Monday's big win.

"The key word is consistency," Duncan said.

"That was the challenge going into the game, like you can't go and win that type of game on Monday and then have a different performance than that. The challenge was to do that again but give us more, and for the most part we ticked a lot of those boxes.

"He's (Sobey) a difference maker right. He's getting his legs back, getting his touch back and he's that type of impactful player."

It was tough going again for the Hawks who have now lost five straight including the last three by a combined 77 points.

Deng Deng top-scored against his old team with 11 points and 11 rebounds with George King adding nine points and Mangok Mathiang eight to go with five boards and two blocks.

Peyton Siva came in for his first game with nine points and five assists while hitting 3/5 from downtown but his new backcourt partner Tyler Harvey again struggled for seven points on 3/13 shooting.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/sobes2zero?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@sobes2zero</a> is cooking early!<br><br>Sobey has 14 points in the first five minutes of action! <br><br>Watch on ESPN via Kayo and Foxtel<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RIVERCITYSTRONG?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RIVERCITYSTRONG</a> <a href="https://t.co/hAahsBCrgd">pic.twitter.com/hAahsBCrgd</a></p>&mdash; Brisbane Bullets (@BrisbaneBullets) <a href="https://twitter.com/BrisbaneBullets/status/1585554520507289600?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 27, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Hawks coach Jacob Jackomas was most disappointed in the lack of response from Monday to this game from his team.

"They came in and they got us on Monday when they were a bit desperate," Jackomas said. 

"We might have underestimated because of their record, but then we come into their house and there's no adjustment. That's probably the biggest thing, we didn’t even show any adjustment in that game from the last one. 

"We had a really good opportunity when you get embarrassed like that on your home floor to come back and show something. We need to figure that out as a whole, myself included."

Even though Peyton Siva made an immediate impact on debut for the Hawks with an early three, the first quarter was the Nathan Sobey show.

Getting back to his best pre-knee injury, the bronze medallist caught fire like never before in his 211-game NBL career. 

He scored 14 points in the first quarter for his best ever performance in a single period and it was on the back of a remarkable patch where he drained three consecutive long balls. He then scored inside the arc before knocking down a fourth triple to be 4/4 from downtown.

The Hawks showed some signs of life with a 9-0 run made up of two threes from George King and another from Wani Swaka Lo Buluk, but it was all Brisbane and they closed the first term on another 8-3 run to be up 29-17.

Things got no better in the second quarter for the Hawks who appeared to have no answers, no offensive flow, no bite on defence and no aggressiveness to attack. That was highlighted with them getting one free-throw for the entire half opposed to 12 from Brisbane.

The Bullets also had 26 rebounds to 16 in the first half while shooting 52 per cent to 31. And with Sobey adding another eight points in the second term to have 22 at half-time, the Bullets were cruising up 52-30.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Tanner Krebs with the rip, the run and the ???? ??<br><br>Catch the <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NBL23?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NBL23</a> action live on ESPN via Kayo Sports and Foxtel <a href="https://t.co/yoDFALEcqQ">pic.twitter.com/yoDFALEcqQ</a></p>&mdash; The NBL (@NBL) <a href="https://twitter.com/NBL/status/1585567646438735872?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 27, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

An early second half three from Tanner Krebs saw Brisbane's lead grow to 26 points and it soon became 27 after three free-throws from Harry Froling.

The lead was still 27 by three quarter-time before Aron Baynes completed a four-point play early in the fourth and from there the teams were largely just going through the motions with the Bullets cruising to the 25-point win.

Illawarra at least finished with Tim Coenraad throwing an alley-oop for the dunk finish from Davo Hickey.

The Hawks now return home to host Melbourne United on Saturday night while it's the only game in Round 5 for the Bullets who don't play again until taking on the Tasmania JackJumpers in Hobart next Saturday.

HUNGRY JACK'S NBL ROUND 5

BRISBANE BULLETS 86 (Sobey 22, Froling 13, Cadee 13)
ILLAWARRA HAWKS 61 (Deng 11, Siva 9, King 9) 
BOX SCORE