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NBL Semi Final Game 2s
TweetHOME teams opened the NBL's semi finals with wins, both losers now looking vulnerable for 2-0 sweeps.
New Zealand ended Adelaide's 10-game winning streak in seriously emphatic fashion 111-82, invoking memories of the Breakers 131-101 win over the 36ers in their only other finals stoush back in 2009.
That was an elimination final, this one Game 1 in the best-of-three semis giving the Sixers hope they can reverse it tonight at Adelaide Arena.
Neither history nor the soft showing they produced at Vector Arena is on their side, Corey Webster and Cedric Jackson controlling the backcourt while Mika Vukona, Ekene Ibekwe and Tai Wesley took no prisoners up forward.
The 36ers had way too many regulars phoning it in or producing an MIA and brought home the fact it was New Zealand which beat them before the streak started.
As the team which ended it, you have to wonder if Dean Vickerman's game plan is working better than Joey Wright's because the Sixers lacked commitment to produce under fire.
At home tonight, you have to expect a big lift but anything less means a Breakers win in two. And unless it's a huge form reversal, it ultimately looks like the Breakers anyway in three.
IN Perth tomorrow, the fans will get a chance to try and lift their outfit after losing 71-64 in Game 1 in Cairns and ending the match in ugly fashion.
Whether Drake U'u intended to foul Torrey Craig as brutally or inexcusably as he did with 4.2 seconds left is irrelevant.
If Craig misses Game 2 because of it, so should U'u through suspension. And any Wildcat fan who thinks otherwise should revisit their attitudes to Josh Childress' hit on Jesse Wagsatff and see if they can stay indignant.
U'u's ill-conceived hit put a pall over the finish but Craig returning from the change-rooms to sign autographs post-match was a positive sign.
Perth had done well, given the debilitating effect of losing as important a cog as Shawn Redhage to injury for the finals in the lead-up.
To keep Cairns to two points in the third quarter is usually the recipe for success.
Instead it is the Wildcats now who must do everything right to force this series to a decider, Scottie Wilbekin the key man after a 23-point, 10-board Game 1 effort.
YEAH, NO KIDDING
DID Brad Rosen and Bill Woods set a new record reminding viewers Shawn Redhage was missing from Perth's team with injury?
No.
That one is still held by their Josh Childress effort late in the regular season.
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