TOTW Rd3: United A-OK on D
TweetTHERE was an abundance of options from NBL Round 3 for our Team of the Week even though - yes we DO know - the round formally doesn't end until Wednesday's Sydney-Tasmania fixture. But after the way they've performed earlier in this round, short of a 50-point JackJumpers upset, neither team is truly in the running.
Instead we have the Wildcats slapping away Brisbane 83-70, then swatting Tasmania 101-83, making their weekly case for consideration, no butts about it.
The Bullets' bounce-back was pretty good to inflict Illawarra's first loss of the season, and then, of course, there was Cairns.
The Taipans left the 36ers at sixes and sevens as they smacked out their biggest ever win over an Adelaide crew more familiar with success than failure in the league's most northern outpost.
This was a massacre and certainly put the Orangemen on our top line of TOTW candidates.
Ultimately though, we could not go past Melbourne United.
First up they devastated Sydney with the most humiliating first quarter in NBL history, launched by a 26-0 start and a 34-5 first quarter.
They held the Kings to 47 points, the lowest tally in the club's history. Then a United team clearly further relishing its growing reputation as defensive specialists, contained New Zealand to a miserly 60 points in a back-up 23-point win.
Those performances - and we did say here weeks ago that United fans should not be even a smidge alarmed by their 0-2 season start - nudged them ahead of Cairns' Adelaide rout, though the Taipans did do Sydney a favour.
Actually, the Kings did themselves a favour by quickly burying the memory of their United embarrassment by bouncing back against South East Melbourne.
That didn't put Sydney in the running for our Team of the Week honours but put it out of consideration as our first "Team of the Weak as Pi$$" award recipient for the current season.
With Cairns' relentless rout of the Sick-sirs, Adelaide was made to look insipid and indolent in one fell swoop. It arguably was the single worst performance in the club's history, full of lifeless, listless and pathetic play, with a complete absence of ticker.
For a team which currently houses the Loggins-Bruton Trophy and its Ray Borner Medallist, it took lack-lustre to a whole new dimension, comfortably making Adelaide our first Team of the Weak As Pi$$.
BASKETBALL ON THE INTERNET TEAM OF THE WEEK
Round 3 Melbourne United
Round 2 South East Melbourne Phoenix
Round 1 Tasmania JackJumpers
BASKETBALL ON THE INTERNET TEAM OF THE WEAK AS PI$$
Round 3 Adelaide 36ers
Round 2 Not awarded
Round 1 Not awarded