Wildcats Find a Spark to Close in on 36th Finals Berth

The pressure was mounting on the Perth Wildcats and the Cairns Taipans turned that up early on Saturday night at RAC Arena, but the 'Cats responded impressively from there to notch the 106-87 victory.

The Wildcats were not only coming off a shock loss to the Adelaide 36ers on Thursday night, but had lost four of their previous five at The Jungle to mean that they needed to find some winning form or a 36th consecutive finals appearance would be in doubt.

On a night where the Wildcats were wearing the black-and-gold of the Westate Wildcats to celebrate the club's 40th anniversary in the NBL, the Taipans started on fire without Scott Machado, Stephen Zimmerman and Mirko Djeric.

With Keanu Pinder firing back in his home state, the Taipans put up 20 points in the first six minutes to put the onus back on the Wildcats to respond, and they did beginning with a combined 14 points to Jesse Wagstaff and Michael Frazier.

Bryce Cotton warmed to the task eventually with his only 10 points in the first half coming at the end of the second quarter before the 'Cats dominated the second half to win by 19.

From the moment Cairns led 36-30 early in the second quarter, Perth outscored them 76 points to 51 the rest of the way to improve 16-10 on the season to remain ahead of the 15-11 Tasmania JackJumpers.

Perhaps the best sign for the Wildcats was import Michael Frazier finding form and confidence with 19 points including going 3/5 from downtown.

Bryce Cotton took almost a half to score but put up 22 points with 10 assists on 5/9 shooting from deep while Vic Law had 17 points before hurting an ankle in the third quarter.

Matt Hodgson had another good game with 14 points, four rebounds and three blocks despite foul trouble while captain Jesse Wagstaff added 12 points.

Wildcats coach Scott Morrison was happy with the improved performance and now hopes they can build on it starting Friday against the Hawks.

"The goal every game should be to play together, be hard to guard as a team, play defence as a team, rebound as a team and I thought the guys did a pretty good job of that tonight," Morrison said.

"Even in the Adelaide, I thought our defence was solid for three quarters much like tonight. I think as a team that's our next challenge obviously while focusing about our opponents we have coming up. But to get to playing at our best, we need to focus on ourselves.

"The challenge now is to do it for four quarters. We've proven we are capable of it but we haven’t proven that we are capable of doing it for 40 minutes. I think we're getting closer so hopefully this is a step in the right direction."

Keanu Pinder delivered 24 points and eight rebounds for Cairns with Majok Deng contributing 16 points, Nate Jawai 12 points, four rebounds and two blocks, and Tahjere McCall 13 points, 11 assists and three steals.

Taipans coach Adam Forde felt ultimately the difference between the two teams was Perth's ability to get offensive rebounds and to force the Snakes into some turnovers, and rushed decisions. 

"In the first half we just couldn’t defend the perimeter very well and we couldn’t defend without fouling, or just simply couldn’t stay in front of our men," Forde said.

"We did a reasonable job on Bryce for the first quarter and eight minutes, and then he goes and scores 10 points to close out that quarter. We had a few lapses there and then the third quarter was the offensive rebounds. 

"That's what Perth does really well and then when you do all the right things defensively, they get the o-board and capitalise on it which really takes the wind out of your sails. Those second chance points were pretty much the margin. 

"We could never quite close the gap in the second half because of an o-board and second chance points for them, or a turnover from us when we probably just needed to settle down a little bit."

Scott Morrison said on Thursday night he knew the Taipans would come into The Jungle smelling blood in the water and that's exactly how the game started with the Snakes racing to a 9-2 lead with Keanu Pinder unstoppable inside, and Ben Ayre draining a three.

Nate Jawai then came on to give Cairns an added spark and different look down low to see their lead grow to 15-9 before Michael Frazier hit the floor for Perth and delivered seven points in a matter of minutes.

The Taipans were up six having point up 20 points in the first six minutes, but the Wildcats finished the first term strongly with Jesse Wagstaff hitting seven quick points and Matt Hodgson throwing down a couple of dunks for the home team to lead 30-29.

Cairns was able to turn things back around to start the second with the opening seven points capped off by a second triple of the night from Ayre and they led 36-30.

The Wildcats were able to steady, though, beginning with a Vic Law triple and then they went on a run of 12 consecutive points topped off by another three from Law and one from captain Wagstaff.

Pinder ensured the Taipans stayed in touch with another eight points going into half-time giving him 18 points and six boards in the half. But Bryce Cotton finally got going with his only 10 points of the half coming in the last couple of minutes to help Perth lead 55-48.

It didn’t take long for Perth to blow the game wide open to start the second half with the opening eight points including a triple from Law and three free-throws from Cotton.

That suddenly saw the lead 15 and while Pinder and Jawai did what they could to keep Cairns close with their team's first 10 points of the second half, the 'Cats were pulling away with Frazier knocking down two more three balls, Cotton hitting another and the lead was 81-67 by three quarter-time.

The Wildcats continued to build some confidence in the fourth quarter even without Law as he sat after rolling his ankle as they cruised to the 19-point win.

The Wildcats have until Friday when they play again at home to the Illawarra Hawks while the Taipans fly straight to Melbourne to take on the league-leading United on Monday night.

HUNGRY JACK'S NBL ROUND 20

PERTH WILDCATS 106 (Cotton 22, Frazier 19, Law 17)

CAIRNS TAIPANS 87 (Pinder 24, Deng 16, McCall 13) 

BOX SCORE