Preview: Brisbane v Illawarra (Round 5)

When: 7.30pm (AEDT), Thursday 27 October, 2022

Where: Nissan Arena, Brisbane  

Broadcast: ESPN; Foxtel; Kayo; Sky NZ

Who won last time?

Brisbane 82 (Baynes 17, Cadee 16, Johnson 11, Sobey 11) d Illawarra 56 (Harvey 13, Froling 11) – Round 4 at WIN Entertainment Centre, Wollongong

Brisbane finally got the winless monkey off their backs on Monday night in Wollongong, and it was thanks to Aron Baynes playing like the big gorilla he’s been through much of his career. The big Banga was made a focus early, finding his touch around the hoop and finding his teammates on the perimeter.

There were few bright spots for the Hawks, who hung tough through sheer grit – and despite their woeful 30, 20 and 41 per cent shooting clips from the field, arc and foul line respectively – to be within single figures late in the third, but Baynes and Jason Cadee shut the door early in the fourth.

What’s working?

Baynes on a roll – You know Aron’s butter when he’s on a roll, and the Bullets found him six times rolling to the hoop in the opening half, which resulted in 12 points on 5/6 shooting. Brisbane shot 86 per cent on plays where Baynes touched the ball as the roller, compared to 38 per cent on all other plays. In perhaps a tale of Brisbane’s inconsistency, they didn’t find Banga once on the roll in the third term and scored just 11 points at 18 per cent.

How do you like them ‘Mangoes’ – Let’s be honest, nothing much worked for Illawarra on Monday, but seeing big Mangok Mathiang powerfully swat away four shots was something for Hawkheads to hang their hats on, as their new recruit works his way back from injury to the form that made him a double-double machine in tough leagues in Italy and Turkey, including leading the TBL in boards and ranking third in blocks in 2019/20.

What needs stopping?

Uncontested misses – It’s easy to say Illawarra have an issue with their offence, but in Monday’s 7/35 three-point shooting display, 16 of 28 misses were uncontested, the Hawks 4/20 on open triples. Tyler Harvey and George King shot a combined 3/13 from deep. In the opening four games the import duo hit 5.2 treys at 40 per cent and the Hawks averaged 83.3ppg. In the past two they’ve made 2.5 at 20 per cent and the team has scored 59ppg.

Not valuing the ball – The Bullets were only -3 in the possession game Monday night, but still coughed up the ball 16 times. So far this season, they’ve had 34 more turnovers and 16 fewer o-boards than their opponents. What does that mean? Their five losses have been by an average margin of 9.2 points, and in those games they’ve averaged 9.4 fewer possessions. The stark reality is not valuing the ball is Brisbane’s biggest issue.

Who’s matching up?

Aron Baynes v Sam Froling – The big Banga dominated this match-up with 17 points and 14 rebounds, the Hawks’ lack of effective ball pressure making Froling’s job tough in the first half. Sam has grabbed just 10 d-boards in the past three games, after averaging six in the first three, and Illawarra need him back to his rebounding best against the bigger Bullets.

DJ Mitchell v George King – Mitchell returned from suspension and didn’t miss a beat, with 10 points, six rebounds, two assists and +23 in 19 minutes. King, on the other hand, had just five points and one rebound in 16 minutes, and his past three games’ return of 7.3ppg at 33 per cent from the field and 3/13 from deep is nowhere near what the Hawks require.

Jason Cadee v Peyton Siva – Illawarra need someone to get their roster clicking, and Siva might be that guy. Despite NZ’s horror season in NBL22, when Peyton was on the floor they were only outscored by 3.3 points per 40 minutes. Without him, they were burned by 15.3 per 40. He’ll need to be switched on defensively on Thursday, given Cadee has racked up 37 points at 50 per cent from deep and nine assists in his two games as a starter.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">JASE GONNA JASE ?<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RIVERCITYSTRONG?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RIVERCITYSTRONG</a> <a href="https://t.co/QvakRoK2oH">pic.twitter.com/QvakRoK2oH</a></p>&mdash; Brisbane Bullets (@BrisbaneBullets) <a href="https://twitter.com/BrisbaneBullets/status/1584490097826623488?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 24, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Who’s saying what?

Judging by coach Jacob Jackomas’ summation after his side’s 26-point humiliation to Brisbane, not a lot is going right for the Hawks right now.

“We need to be better defensively to get some cheap points, we need to be better together offensively when we’re moving the ball, we need a little bit more skill, we need a little bit more luck, the ball going through the hole and seeing the ball go through the hole,” he said.

Monday’s game was hardly one for the archives as the ball struggled to drop at both ends.

The NBL has a strong reputation worldwide as a physical beast, and with the league on track to call the fewest fouls in the professional era, the physicality has gone to another level.

The result in Round 4 was the Hawks scoring 56, three teams scoring in the 60s and another three in the 70s, with six shooting performances 40 per cent or lower.

Veteran Tim Coenraad, who experienced this combative style of play during his early years in the league, believes his team needs to embrace the grind or get left behind.

“Right now we’re soft on rebounds, we get picked, we don’t fight over screens, all the little things in the game,” he said

“The only way we can get better at this is looking at ourselves in the mirror and saying, ‘Hey we’re really soft, across the board’.

“If you get picked on a screen it opens everything up for them. We come off a screen, the guy fights over, we get nothing. That means everything in a basketball game."

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Watch your head ? JC ? Ty<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RIVERCITYSTRONG?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RIVERCITYSTRONG</a> <a href="https://t.co/rMgTtSpEjo">pic.twitter.com/rMgTtSpEjo</a></p>&mdash; Brisbane Bullets (@BrisbaneBullets) <a href="https://twitter.com/BrisbaneBullets/status/1584483219050618880?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 24, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

For coach Jackomas, the current style of play means knocking down the open shots that do come is super important, but so is better variety in their offence, especially against Brisbane’s changing defences.

“Their zone got us a bit at the beginning, but I thought we moved it enough and got some open ones in the end. We probably relied on the three-ball a little bit too much and didn’t get our feet in the paint at all,” he said.

“I think it’s becoming a trend now where it’s not going through the hole, we just need to keep getting more shots at practice, keep letting guys shoot the shots they want to shoot, not messing with their heads too much.”

The Bullets might have got inside their heads a little before Monday’s win in Wollongong, according to Nathan Sobey.

“The belief was always there but once you start stringing some losses together you start pinpointing everything you’re doing bad, it can get pretty nasty with the film you’re watching, because it all comes out, all the little stuff,” he said.

“The coaches have done a good job of showing us good stuff during those times along with the bad, and the group’s been pretty level-headed with everything that’s been going on with the 0-5 start.

“There’s a lot of us that don’t like losing at all, in the past we might have gone about it differently and dropped our heads, but the group’s stuck together.”

Sobey knows Thursday’s rematch is unlikely to be pretty, and it’s about doing whatever it takes possessions after possession to scrape out a win, whether the scores are in the 50s or the 90s.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Let’s go Tanner ? Keep hustling.<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RIVERCITYSTRONG?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RIVERCITYSTRONG</a> <a href="https://t.co/x2f50AQ4YS">pic.twitter.com/x2f50AQ4YS</a></p>&mdash; Brisbane Bullets (@BrisbaneBullets) <a href="https://twitter.com/BrisbaneBullets/status/1584486327520591872?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 24, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

“There’s so many good teams in this league and it’s going to be a scrappy fight,” he said.

“We've got to bring our best every night, the first five games we had a few lapses and it hurts us. That shows how strong the competition is.”

It’s certainly desperation time for the Hawks, who have gone from toppling the Phoenix and running high-quality Sydney, Perth and Adelaide rosters deep into the game, to being obliterated by New Zealand and Brisbane.

Coach Jackomas will be hoping Peyton Siva brings better organisation, and the whole roster brings better energy, especially on the glass.

“I think it’s an easy turnaround for us because we’re playing the exact same team, we can pinpoint the exact situations that killed us,” he said.

“We got beat on the rebound count which isn’t something we want to do, at the end they did pile it on a little bit on our defence.

“Then see if we can get some guys in better spots but I thought we were three-point heavy today, we didn’t get our feet into the paint.

“We played to their game plan, totally, they wanted to zone it they wanted us to either quick shoot it or shoot threes and they rebound and go.”