Adelaide 36ers 90-71 NZ Breakers

Welcome to the new era of the Australian National Basketball League. A massive TV deal with Fox Sports means that we’ll be getting live & HD coverage of the comp with more primetime action and no pesky ad breaks in-play (which apparently used to happen). Breakers icons CJ Bruton and Andrej Lemanis are included on the commentary team (along with a few members of Fox’s rugby league team, namely Andrew Voss, Warren Smith and Matt Russell).

Sky Sports NZ have got in on the game too, securing NZ broadcast rights to every Breakers game (and now that won’t have to include internet streams) as well as at least three live games a round (with others delayed).

With all that fresh money it’s like a new competition. A redesigned website, a flashy new app, a badass hashtag… (#hardball) basketball in these parts of the world has never been in better shape. There’s no question that the success of guys like Patty Mills, Andrew Bogut and, yes, Steven Adams has contributed to all this. The NBL looks sexier than ever before in HD on Sky via Fox. (Just a shame about the graphics issues).

The new TV deal is also why the Breakers began their title defence on a Wednesday night away to the Adelaide 36ers. More primetime games means more primetimes to utilise. Unfortunately the season came a little too early for the New Zealand Breakers.

A Mika Vukona travel ended the first possession of the season, but on the next go Cedric Jackson went and burnt Adam Gibson for a layup to open the scoring. It took the home side almost 3 minutes to get on the board as both teams struggled to find their radars, though a couple nice defensive plays by Tai Wesley were cause for optimism.

The Breakers played a lot of small formations, Tai Wesley starting alongside Mika Vukona and Reuben Te Rangi getting the start at SF – which seems like the way going forward with him. Everard Bartlett started for the NBA-busy Corey Webster, both Tom Abercrombie and Alex Pledger out injured for the start of the campaign. Abs & Pledge are close to returns. Webster likely won’t be seen until at least the end of October… or possibly never again if all goes well.

While the 36ers were missing shots, that small ball approach was working great. Quick transitions led by Cedric and quality pound-for-pound rebounding from Mika got NZB to an early lead but once the 36ers began nailing ‘em, things turned sharply. Gibson started attacking the rim, freeing up the big unit Ebi Ere (a 34 year old import who offered plenty of smarts) and that opened up a three point game too. By the end of the first it was 19-17 to Adelaide.

The foreshadowing was there but it was still hard to take what happened next. A slick Adelaide offence started getting off all the shots they wanted, Ere from three, Gibson off the dribble, Teys getting around Shane Mac… the worst was rookie Matt Hodgson using his superior size to do whatever he wanted. He could have played keepaway if he’d wanted to, just holding the ball too high out of the reach of any Breaker, standing there laughing as they all jumped in vain.

But while that was more a cleverly coached team doing what they can (shout out Joey Wright) and hitting some tough shots, the Breakers own offence was an out-of-synch mess. If Cedric Jackson wasn’t creating something by driving to the hoop, there was nothing happening. Actually nothing. A Tai Wynyard (getting a few mins late in the quarter) hook shot late on gave the Breakers their first field goal in nearly nine minutes, breaking a 0/15 run. They shot 2/20 for the quarter, outscored 32-9. Down by 25 points at the break, the second worst halftime deficit in the club’s history.

It was a glorified training run from there on. Cedric again was able to spark a small comeback only for his efforts to be curtailed by a fourth personal foul. A couple times Tai Wesley was able to post up and that was a genuine option, but the three ball was disastrous. Apart from a couple hits from Bartlett, there was nothing happening there. Te Rangi and McDonald were a combined 1/10. Cedric and Wesley have plenty to offer any offence but deep shooting is not part of that, they were 1/9 combined. All together, the Breakers shot 6/30 from beyond the arc, another game in the way of a coupe last season where no offence becomes spotting triples all the time to no avail.

It’s probably fair to say the 36ers took the foot off the gas in the second half. All the same, there were some nice flashes for NZB. Charles Jackson, or Catfish Jackson as he is thus now dubbed, was able to make a big impact after a sloppy first half, hauling in rebounds (especially offensive boards) and showing the strength and touch to finish close to the rim in traffic. Plus the dude had three alley-oops, showing he can get up above that rim too.

A bit of sloppiness crept into the 36ers game that allowed the lead to close up. It didn’t last. Soon it was Gibson, Teys and Creek all pulling out the spin moves and the handles to shut this thing down. Adam Gibson was the best for the Sixers, he had 11p/8a/6r, while Hodgson added 18 points and 9 rebounds off the bench. Daniel Johnson’s 15 points and Ere’s 13 didn’t do any harm either.

For the Breakers, Cedric top scored with 14, also offering 6 assists. Bartlett showed glimpses of filling C.Webby’s shoes with 3/8 from 3pt in his 13 points while Wesley had 10p/2a/4r and Catfish logged 12p/7r (albeit with 3 turnovers).

To be honest, there were large spells where this team looked lost without the talents of three of their starting five. Things won’t be as brutal against the Crocs at Vector on Sunday, but there’s gonna need to be plenty more offensive cohesion before this team is back at the level they reached last year. The good news is that reinforcements are coming.

Stocks:

Movin’ On Up Like Curtis Mayfield – Ekene Ibekwe ended up as an irreplaceable player with that historic title-winning shot in last year’s finals. Charles ‘Catfish’ Jackson takes over that role on the roster, both positionally and contractually as an import. The 22 year old is much rawer and is on his first pro contract after spending NBA Summer League with the Philadelphia 76ers. His skill set is quite different to Ebeks, also. He’s got a much bigger frame and by the looks of it he’s got potential to work that low post stuff into the mix, whereas Ebekwe was a dude that dominated above the hoop. Catfish probably surely have the jump shot of his predecessor but we’ll see. He should get more of a role when Alex Pledger is back and the team has the personnel to revert to a more typical rotation. Catfish Jackson was the only real centre in the team for game one, and so most of his stuff came in the garbage time that was the second half.

Goin’ Down Slow Like Howlin’ Wolf – Unfortunately another new addition had a debut he’d sooner forget. Shane McDonald’s is a wonderful story, the 30 year old was a school teacher a couple months ago before he snagged the last spot on this roster. He’s a battler of a guard with good energy and has starred in lower grades in Oz. But here he couldn’t find his shooting touch in his 20 mins, hitting only 2 of 11 and he didn’t have a single assist to go with his 7 points (not that the rest of the team shot well around him for that to happen – 37% from the field) and got smoked a couple times defensively. He’s a wily fella, Old McDonald is. He should come good in more favourable matches.

Key Stat

Honestly, it’s that second quarter. 32-9 – a complete disaster. According the NBL.com.au, that first half was the second lowest scoring total in the club’s history. 26 points.