Kings Make it 11 Straight to Stay in Top Spot Race

The Adelaide 36ers made them work for it but the Sydney Kings prevailed 84-77 to make it 11 consecutive wins as they maintain their hopes of still finishing this NBL regular season in top spot.

The 36ers were playing their second last home game at Adelaide Entertainment Centre this season in front of another healthy crowd of nearly 5000 fans. 

The home side did their best to take it up to the Kings, but Sydney just had too much firepower in the finish as they kept their momentum going even with Ian Clark a late scratching when he couldn’t get through the warm up in Adelaide.

The Kings have been in hot form over the past 10 games and this win was more of a grind, but a lot of the credit for that can be given to the energy the 36ers played with and the focus they had to playing solid defence to at least make life difficult for Sydney.

While the Kings did enough to win, it wasn’t the type of emphatic performance that they had delivered in their last two road wins to the Perth Wildcats and Tasmania JackJumpers, but it still saw them notch 11 consecutive wins and to improve to 16-7 on the season.

While it's a 16th loss on the season for the 36ers, there were positives to take from the effort overall for coach CJ Bruton as they now prepare for a final home game of the season on Monday against Brisbane before four road matches over the final two rounds.

Xavier Cooks was playing his third game back from an ankle injury and produced an impressive performance for the Kings made up of 22 points, nine rebounds, three blocked shots and two assists.

DJ Vasiljevic put up 15 points while Jarell Martin added 13 points and six rebounds, Jaylen Adams 12 and five assists, and Makur Maker nine points and eight rebounds.

Kings coach Chase Buford was happy with the win, but not necessarily the performance from his team.

"I thought for just about three quarters we guarded them pretty well especially in the third," Buford said.

"They got a little hot to start the game and I think after about the first five minutes of the game we kind of locked in and started to play some good defence. I'm not very proud of the way we finished the game though. 

"I think we didn’t treat the game with enough respect or play it the right way down the stretch and just kind of lost our composure, and edge. Obviously that let them back in it down the stretch."

The Sixers battled hard but just didn’t shoot well in the end going 26/74 from the field at 35 per cent and 9/35 from deep at 25 per cent.

Daniel Johnson top-scored again with 20 points, seven rebounds and four assists with Todd Withers adding 10 points and five boards, Hyrum Harris 10 points and six rebounds, and Kai Sotto eight points and four rebounds.

Sixers coach CJ Bruton couldn’t fault his team's effort for the most part, but the Kings' quality came to the fore in the long run.

"I thought the energy was good, we came out and I thought we controlled the game," Bruton said.

"Adams is an MVP candidate, Xavier Cooks is All-First Team so it's a tough check, but I thought our game plan was good and we executed well to start. Yes, we missed some shots but then I think we went away from it and things dried up and there were two or three patches that made a difference. 

"I tried not to let it stretch too far but once it got a little bit bigger down the back stretch, we needed to play with better pace and pick that up, and play up the floor a little more. In the end, we were unsuccessful though."

The Kings got off to a perfect start with DJ Vasiljevic draining a three ball but the 36ers soon steadied into their work and five straight points head them leading 7-5.

Daniel Johnson led the way and put up nine opening quarter points but Vasiljevic had six for Sydney and they led 19-18 by quarter-time.

Vasiljevic and Xavier Cooks then combined to put the Kings up eight to open the second quarter but Adelaide were digging in and went on a run of scoring eight of the next 10 points including four more from Johnson to draw back level.

It was Sydney's turn to respond with 12 of the next 15 points but the Sixers were making a game of it and limited the Kings lead to six at the major break.

Despite Cooks opening up the second half with an and-one play for the Kings, but the 36ers scored the next six with four of them from Hyrum Harris to keep things tight.

It wasn’t until late in the quarter when Makur Maker kickstarted eight consecutive Sydney points to put the visitors up 64-51 after three.

To Adelaide's credit, they never stopped fighting and there were a couple of times they got back within six points with Nick Marshall, Kai Sotto, Tad Dufelmeier and Harris all stepping.

However, Sydney continued to have all the answers and eventually Cooks and Jaylen Adams inspired a late run of 10 of 12 points. Only Adelaide scoring the last eight points brought the final margin back to seven.

The 36ers have a short turnaround to play their final home game of the season now on Monday night against the Brisbane Bullets. The Kings head to Bendigo now to play the New Zealand Breakers on Tuesday.

HUNGRY JACK'S NBL ROUND 19

ADELAIDE 36ERS 77 (Johnson 20, Harris 10, Withers 10)

SYDNEY KINGS 84 (Cooks 22, Vasiljevic 15, Martin 13) 

BOX SCORE