NBL Semi Final Game 1

Melbourne v Brisbane

Game one of tonight’s double header sees the Tigers hosting the Bullets.  Just when I thought that the scheduling of NBL games could not get any worse, game 2 of this semi final series is on tomorrow night (I am going to be polite here and say that this is disappointing).  The Bullets emerged victorious in both of the regular season meetings (by 4 points at home in round 14 and by 20 points in Melbourne in round 20).

The key to success for the Tigers here is that their shooters need to hit their shots.  The likes of Daryl Corletto, Dave Barlow and Stephen Hoare will get plenty of open looks as the Bullets will be double teaming Chris Anstey a lot.  Import Sean Lampley was a handful for the Bullets during the regular season meetings and he will need another big game tonight to ease the offensive burden on Anstey.  Defensively the plan is simple (in theory anyway), stop CJ Bruton and import Ebi Ere.  Import Dave Thomas and Barlow will most likely alternate the job on Ere.  They are both quite capable of forcing him into taking really tough shots and Ere is just as capable at making these shots.  I believe the Tigers may have a tougher time slowing down Bruton.  The likes of Nathan Crosswell and Darryl McDonald can not keep Bruton in front of them.  Brutons ability to penetrate and find the open man with his passing game also makes his team mates that much more dangerous.

As I have already alluded to, the Bullets need to get 2 of their more experienced playoff campaigners going in Ere and Bruton.  They are both more than capable of handling the challenge and their team mates will feed off their play, especially that of Bruton’s.  Coach Joey Wright has also said that they intend to make Anstey work hard on defence.  I would expect the likes of Craig Bradshaw, Justin Brown and Dusty Rychart to take it at Anstey.  Defensively they will have to try and slow down Anstey and Lampley.  In Rychart, Dillon Boucher, Bradshaw and Brown they do have plenty of big men to put on him.  They will need to throw their double teams at these two and they will need to choose their methods of doing so carefully.  Their rotations will also need to be spot on.

I believe the Tigers are too short here.  Defensively the Bullets are a lot better equipped to handle the challenges in front of them than what the Tigers are.  The Tigers at home do deserve to be slight favourites, however, with the amount of players that the Bullets have who can hit the big shots along with their overall firepower; they look like value in the current line betting and with the prospect of them really firing, a small play on them to win the game is also warranted.  The points total looks too high to me.  The Tigers could very well come out sluggish after their long break.  The intensity of a playoff game tells me that both teams could quite possibly go through a cold patch or two in this game and that the unders look like value.

Brisbane +6.0 at $1.91 (Lasseters) - 2 units
Brisbane at $2.85 (Lasseters) - 1 unit
Under 208.0 (Lasseters) - 1 unit   

NBL Semi Final Game 2

Perth v Sydney

The biggest off-season recruit decided to leave it until game one of his team’s semi final series to really show his worth, better late than never I guess.  Glen Saville has been his active self all season long, but his shooting has been inconsistent.  In game one two days ago; his shooting was also there which meant that the Kings were never really in trouble.  When they did look like they may falter in the closing minutes, he hit a couple of very big shots to put the game beyond doubt.  For a playoff game, both teams did shoot incredibly high percentages.  Whether or not that will happen again remains to be seen in Perth tonight.

The Wildcats made one of their bigger adjustments in this series in the second half of game one, looking after the ball.  It looked like the Coaching staff made them realise at the half time interval that those who are not exceptional ball handlers on their team (which is almost everyone apart from import Gerald Brown) should not over dribble when bringing the ball up the court and that the traps in the Kings press are not overly difficult to pass out of.  Another adjustment that I would expect them to make is looking to get the ball into the post a bit earlier.  Unless Jason Smith is standing in front of them when they have the ball (who Peter Crawford in particular had a lot of success at beating off the dribble), they should give the likes of Paul Rogers, Shawn Redhage and Alex Loughton more time to assess their options in the post which will make them more dangerous.  The main defensive adjustment I believe may come in their help defence.  It was terrible in the first half but still not great in the second.  Paul Rogers looked to be the main culprit throughout the game.  Instead of showing a little bit more faith in the defence of his team mates (in particularly Loughton and Redhage in the post, who are very good defenders), he committed to helping at the point when they did not really seem to need it which in turn created a lot of the open looks for the Kings as his team mates looked confused as to how they were meant to rotate out to the Kings shooters as a result of him committing too early.

The biggest adjustment the Kings will have to make is playing without their leading scorer, Mark Worthington, who is suspended for elbowing Shawn Redhage in game one.  Import Isaiah Victor will most likely step into the starting lineup as a result.  Provided that he handles the extra 10 minutes or so that he will likely get, he is a more than capable replacement.  Coach Brian Goorjian would not have been happy with the 18 turnovers his troops committed in game one (with a lot of these coming through his players being quite tentative in various stages during the game).  I believe giving import Dontaye Draper, the most natural and confident ball handler on his team more court time will alleviate such problems.  Goorjian also said that he will probably look at making some minor defensive adjustments.

I have received some mail that Redhage is in doubt for this game after suffering a minor concussion from Worthington’s elbow.  If he is healthy enough to take his place, the current line betting looks about right to me.  If I get some mail that he is confirmed out, anything under minus 4.5 about the Kings will look like value that I will take.  Until I know his status, I will not be getting involved in the line betting. The points total looks to be about right to me.