NBL Round 10

Adelaide v Townsville

A winning streak will come to an end for one of these teams.  The Crocs (4 in a row) travel to Adelaide (3 in a row) after demolishing the weary looking Melbourne on their home court on Wednesday.  The Crocs (7 wins, 7 losses) will look to move above 50% on the season whilst a win for Adelaide (5 wins, 6 losses) will look to get to 50% which should make this a keenly contested game.

The last 2 of Adelaide’s wins came without Brett Maher (calf).  Even though it was against opposition that has not been travelling all that well (Singapore away and South Dragons at home).  The contributions that they got from imports Adam Ballinger and Mike Chappell during those two games were encouraging and Coach Phil Smyth and co. will hope that they can continue.

The Crocs, as bad as Melbourne was, were quite good on Wednesday.  Led by import Corey Williams, who will prove almost impossible to guard if he can hit the odd jumpshot, just ran Melbourne off the court.  Williams was nicely backed up by John Rillie, who would be keen to have a big game against his former club.  Williams did approach the game against Melbourne as a personal mission to get the win and it was a very intense effort from the team as a whole.  Letting up against a lesser opponent after such a game is something that the Crocs will need to be wary of. 

Given how tight the NBL ladder is, with these two teams being right in the middle of it, either team letting up in this game would be a surprise to me.  Containing Ballinger will be a priority for the Crocs (double teaming him like they did with Chris Anstey on Wednesday may do the trick).  Adelaide will need to find a way to slow Williams down.  If he still is on a ‘personal mission’ to play well (also known as absolutely destroy the opposition).  Adelaide will not be able to slow him down.  Adelaide’s poor interior defence also has me thinking that Ben Pepper may have a field day.  I think Townsville are some value in the current market.  The points total seems slightly low, but not quite enough to warrant a play on the overs.

Townsville +3.5 @ $1.91 Lasseters - 1 unit
Townsville @ $2.35 Bill Hurley, Lasseters - 1 unit

Cairns v Sydney

The top of the table Kings aim for their seventh win in a row in Cairns.  Cairns will be under manned again but are always tough to beat on their home court.

The Taipans won’t have Martin Cattalini, who is out for the season with an Achilles injury.  They will also still be without import Rashad Tucker (groin injury).  There is also speculation that he may be on his way out of the Taipans, which will become clearer early next week I would imagine.  They easily accounted for the New Zealand Breakers on Thursday in an impressive away win.  Most impressive were Nathan Jawai, Larry Abney and (perhaps the most pleasing) from the Taipans’ point of view, Darnell Mee.  There still is plenty of talent on this team.  When you add Stephen Black to the mix, they will still be able to compete with the league leaders.  They will all need to be on their game though.

The Kings come into this game having not played in the last nine days; it will be interesting to see how they come out and play after such a long break.  They deservedly occupy position one on the ladder.  The pressuring defence, their good ball movement and their improved play of Mark Worthington have been the main drivers behind their success.  Add to this the constant improvement of imports Dontaye Draper and Isiah Victor and it will be hard to see them slowing down anytime soon.

The key to this game will be the amount of support that Jawai can get offensively.  There is no play for me on this game as the current market looks about right.  I will simply be looking to sit back and enjoy the online radio broadcast of this game as it should be a cracker.    

Dragons v Slingers

The 11th placed South Dragons host the last placed Singapore Slingers to wrap up round 10 of the NBL.  Both will be keen to end their respective losing streaks. 

The Dragons come into this game losing the last two of their triple header last week, after they impressively disposed of the West Sydney Razorbacks.  They nearly overcame a 23 point deficit late in the third quarter to go down by just 3 on Adelaide’s home court in their last game.  Their new import Bakari Hendrix has been very impressive thus far.  If they make more of an effort to get him more touches closer to the basket (and not shoot so many mid and long range shots), they will climb up the ladder in a hurry.

In a case of stating the obvious, the Slingers will get the wooden spoon this year.  I cannot recall the last time I saw such a 2-man team.  The 2 men I am referring to are their imports Mike Helms and Rod Grizzard.  Both are very good players but they get very limited contributions from their team mates.  Outside of Ben Knight (Coach Gordon McLeod and the imports really should look to get him more involved), there is minimal experience at this level of basketball amongst the rest of their squad.  They will be giving their all to avoid their fifth loss in a row.

The only way that I can see the Slingers being competitive in this game is if the Dragons don’t turn up to play through underestimating them.  Given their current record, I don’t see this happening.  The markets in this game seem spot on to me.