Last year the Breakers stormed on into the finals on the back of a commanding defence. People would have seen a dude like Cedric Jackson, a dude like Corey Webster, and gone: yeah mate, look at the scoring there but neither guy was all that efficient. Jackson scored and created but he turned the ball over a bit and shot it like it was made of lead while Webster was all usage. Give him 15 shots and he’ll top score. Give him 5-10 and he struggles to have the same impact.

Sure, Corey sat third on the table in 2015-16 with 19.8 points per game but he also took the most shots and his 39.6% mark form the field dropped him all the way back to 43rd among qualified NBL players. Being a guard you don’t look at him to shoot 50% or anything so that ain’t as bad as it sounds. Still, despite being comfortably the best free throw shooter in the team he also only got to the line the fourth most on average in that Breakers side – Jackson, Abercrombie and Other Jackson all shooting more despite being sub-60% the lot of them.

The point being they weren’t exactly clinical and their best scorer thrived playing hero ball in the fourth quarter of games. For that team, that was nearly enough. Sixth out of eight teams in points per game with 83.0, shooting a seventh best 32.6% from threes with a league high 13.7 turnovers each contest. And yet they were 40 minutes away from winning it all and the reason was a superb defence.

Look, in the finals against Perth they shut down Cedric Jackson by taking away his lane to the hoop. They made him shoot and they played him tough, not afraid to foul a ball-handling guard who shoots 51.6% FTs. They forced the Breakers to play through their own weaknesses and it earned them a title. Jackson definitely has more than a couple weaknesses too – he didn’t last too long at a fumbling Melbourne United team that’s for sure. But the man can defend. Mate, can he defend. A man who inhales loose balls and ranks up among the finest rebounding point guards this league has ever witnessed plus he’s a bloody bulldog on the perimeter.

How else did the Breakers keep opposition teams to a three point mark even lower than their own (31.1%)? How else did the Breakers keep opposition teams to a mere 80.8 points per game (second only to Perth, whose defence won them all rings)? In Dean Vickerman’s final stint with the club they won games by grinding them out and knowing that eventually one of those triples from Webster was gonna drop clean.

That’s 450 words on last season right there. There’s a reason for last season, don’t freak out. In the offseason the Breakers lost Cedric Jackson to a better offer and saw that as a chance to make this team more sustainable. Mika Vukona’s only getting older, they don’t have a shut-down guard to replace Cedric, the club’s entering a new era… plenty of reasons to try fix the imbalance that eventually caught up with them. So they signed Kirk Penney and went about looking to score some damn points.

Flash forward to the present day and it’s not going all that well. The Breakers sit at 7-9, one win off the foot of the table and they’ve lost five of their last six. Across that stretch they’ve given up a lot of points. Like, A LOT of points:

• L 109-78 away to Illawarra
• L 91-80 away to Cairns
• L 95-51 home to Illawarra
• L 98-74 away to Melbourne
• W 82-75 home to Brisbane
• L 102-92 away to Adelaide

Clearly a bit of travel involved there but the lads will soon be able to rest after Thursday night’s stint against Perth at Vector Arena with a two week break until after Christmas. Ignoring that much needed win against Brisbane – a team that didn’t exist last season – that’s 109, 91, 95, 98 and 102 points conceded across five games. Average that out to 99 points per game and clearly that’s beyond ridiculous. They don’t have a hope in hell of making the playoffs if they’re leaking points like that, come on.

Remember how good they were at defending the three ball? Opponents now shoot an NBL-best 39.4% against them. The 88.0 points they leak every time they take the court is second worst, only Adelaide have a worse margin. The offensive switcharoo has worked to an extent as they’re now the third top scoring team with 85.9 PPG yet that’s not enough to cover the distance the defence has plummeted.

Right so who do we blame? Eh, that’s not really fair. We’re dealing with a rookie coach (a very good one but a rookie all the same) and several new key players. One of those is Kirk Penney who as of recently has really started to look sharp, it’s not really a shocker that an older player might take a while to ease into his best rhythm. Kirk had a great weekend scoring 41 points as the Breaks split those last two results on that list, shooting a combined 9 of 14 from deep. But… he’s also 36 years old and pretty slow on his feet to close some of those shooters down.

Tom Abercrombie does a very good job on the wings with his defence but the two real defensive anchors they have are Akil Mitchell and Mika Vukona, both power forwards. Alex Pledger does a fine job inside as well, so you won’t need to sit down and sip on a glass of water when you find out they’re still one of the best rebounding teams even without the triple-double threat of Cedric Jackson.

However it’s dynamic outside shooters that they’ve had no answer for. Jerome Randle just dropped 37 on them the other night for Adelaide. Casper Ware scored 26 as Melbourne beat them. The losses to Illawarra? Rotnei Clarke had 22 in each of them. And in between Travis Trice scored 31 for Cairns. Those are guys that can shoot from range or drive to the basket. Some of them create for others, some of them get to the line with proficiency. The one thing that ties them all together is that the Breakers have nobody to guard them.

David Stockton is a tiny bugger whose abilities are more with the ball in hand than his on-ball defence. Coming from a decent level, he can clearly play a bit of D but he’s also joined the team mid-season. Corey Webster has played through injury all season and while he happens to be a very talented defender he’s not always the most zoned in. Anyway, he’s been ruled out for the foreseeable future because of all those injuries, let’s come back to that later. Then there’s Shae Ili and the now-departed Isaih Tueta, both youngsters whose energy doesn’t always overshadow their naivety.

Stocko’s the answer at the moment but again, the dude’s pretty small. And there’s no way you’re switching Mika out there if you can help it when he’s already averaging a shade under four personal fouls. Of course… there was another guy by the name of Ben Woodside. Not the most athletic but an experienced pro who knew his role and never tried to overplay it. He went down injured in an overtime win in Melbourne, the sixth game of the season, and although the Breaks were 3-3 at that time, they were also conceding a more appropriate 85.2 PPG (and dealing with a slow start from their shooting guards). Fair to say that, even with Stockton’s passing nous, they haven’t fully replaced Woodside. But they have a chance to do so now in the short term…

Paul Henare: “Corey has been battling injury throughout the season but it has become increasingly clear that he is not able to play at the level he is used to nor indeed the level that we as a team need him to be operating at. We have made the call to give Corey that chance to get himself fully fit, to seek out the best rehab programme available away from the pressure of playing, training and travelling. What the detail of that plan looks like we don’t know just yet, how long it takes we don’t know yet, but we felt it was time for him to step back and get himself healthy.”

Right. Webster on the injury waiver and they’re looking for a third import to pick up his slack, hopefully by their game on December 30. The overall season of Corey Webster is probably the theme of a whole other column but suffice to say that this is how his numbers stack up compared to the career year that preceded it.

2015-16 Webster:

33.5 MIN | 18.1 FGA | 39.6 FG% | 34.4 3PT% | 2.2 REB | 2.3 AST | 2.6 TO | 19.8 PTS

2016-17 Webster:

28.2 MIN | 12.1 FGA | 35.7 FG% | 28.0 3PT% | 1.7 REB | 2.9 AST | 2.6 TO | 11.7 PTS

We knew all along that he was having issues with his back and it turns out that, as often happens, that’s also made for a few other creaks and rusty spots. You never really know how much it affects a player though and this latest news puts it all in a new perspective. Just quietly the fact that he’s got a court date coming up may have had absolutely zero to do with this but it also doesn’t seem like the worst timing for a month or two’s rest. As made clear in the press release – and it’s 100% true – this is a league where the games can pile up and you don’t get much time to rehabilitate if you do get hurt. Alex Pledger could tell you that much with how long his foot injury lingered.

Don’t kid yourself that this move would have been decided upon if Webby was dropping 20+ a night. The exact same injury would have been shrugged off and all would be sweet as. But he’s not. And if Corey Webster isn’t shooting well, isn’t scoring enough and isn’t able to play at his best in an important defensive role either then he’s actually a bit of a liability, although it takes great honesty from the club and the lad himself to admit that.

In salary capped leagues you need production from your best players. Webster is one of the Breakers’ best players and has been dead average for his vast abilities. Basketball is a sport where one bright talent can make all the difference – look at what happens to NBA teams when their number one guy is missing. Having a fully fit Corey Webster makes this team a threat once again but having a hobbled one wasn’t cutting it. Here’s hoping he’s back fresh in a month or two.

So pats on the back all around as this also opens up what might prove their path back to contention because if they can find an international player who does all of the things that they expect of Webster and haven’t been getting then suddenly that rosy glow of pre-season will be back… and just in time for Christmas too.

MVP Points at Adelaide

Kirk Penney – 3

Mika Vukona – 2

Akil Mitchell – 1

MVP Points vs Brisbane

Rob Loe – 3

Kirk Penney – 2

Tom Abercrombie – 1

Overall MVP Standings

Kirk Penney – 17

Tom Abercrombie – 16

Alex Pledger – 13

Up Next

Thursday, 7.30pm: NZ Breakers vs Perth Wildcats, Vector Arena (NZT)