NZ Breakers 83-107 Illawarra Hawks

Kirk Penney has played many great games of basketball in New Zealand but this wasn’t meant to be one of them. As the title says, this isn’t one we wanna spend too much time on. It was ugly.

Penney scored the first points of the game with a three pointer from the right arc and the Hawks never looked back. Their sharp shooting got them 34 first quarter points, that’s just an unacceptable tally to concede. It cannot happen. Penney scored 10 of those points and had 16 at the half without a miss from the field but it wasn’t only him, Kevin Lisch was magnificent himself, carrying on the form that would see him named NBL Player of the Week while AJ Ogilvy was pretty formidable himself.

This was a Hawks team working with a nine-man rotation after Rhys Martin was left back at the hotel with a stomach virus – stay away from the veal, buddy. Meanwhile the Breakers were more or less at full strength, everyone suited up, not that you could tell on the court. The Hawks got out to an early 19-6 lead and the Breaks were never again within nine points. Lazy offence early on settling for deep shots and defensively they were once again torched by a team that put 96 points on them in a big win the last time they played. The Breakers are generally a very good team off the ball but they’ve twice been destroyed by a team that passes the ball swiftly around the perimeters and shoots well from three. It’s tough to combat that, but you need to come up with something.

On the positive, there were good offensive contributions from Corey Webster who shot 10 of 17 for 25 points and Tai Wesley with 20 points on 9 of 13 shooting. But both of the Jacksons were inefficient and others struggled to get involved. Not good.

Maybe they could have gotten back into it with some smarter basketball, but to be honest they didn’t shoot that badly. It was the turnovers that killed them, all 20, meaning they shot 14 times fewer than their opponents. Though if we’re being honest then that was only five more than the Hawks’ 15.

What this confirms is that the Hawks are legitimately in the championship conversation. The Breakers obviously remain in that convo, as do the Wildcats and Melly and the rest are all in the chasing pack at this stage.

Stocks:

Movin’ On Up Like Curtis Mayfield – Competition depth is about all we can fall back on. Maybe this is a welcome wake-up call too, what with it being their first loss at home all season. Now they know that these things don’t come for granted, just in case they needed a reminder (which they almost certainly didn’t – but it’s helpful for us clumsy fans at least).

Goin’ Down Slow Like Howlin’ Wolf – Catfish Jackson only played 12 minutes. Part of that was Tai Wesley playing well and the Breaks stacking their line-up with shooters, part was the three fouls he picked up in that short time and part was the fact that he wasn’t stopping Ogilvy at all. AJO finished with 18 points. Penney topped with 27 and Lisch scored 24.

Key Stat

This 24 point loss was the Breakers’ biggest ever at Vector Arena, beating out their 20 point mauling at the hands of the Sydney Kings last season.

Play of the Game

That pass. So good.

Season Standings

Cedric Jackson – 24

Corey Webster – 20

Tom Abercrombie – 18

Match MVP Points

Corey Webster – 3

Tai Wesley – 2

Mika Vukona – 1

Up Next

Sunday, 7pm: Sydney Kings vs NZ Breakers, Sydney Olympic Park Sports Centre (NZT)