R4 Preview: Cairns Taipans v New Zealand Breakers

When: 7.30pm (AEDT), Monday 8 February

Where: Cairns Pop-up Arena

Broadcast: SBS Viceland; Sky Sports NZ; SBS On Demand; Twitch

The last time
New Zealand 85 (T Webster 25, Patterson 22, Delany 13) d Cairns 79 (Machado 25, Oliver 19, Noi 10), Round 4, Cairns Pop-up Arena

Well, when you’re 1-5, having dropped four on the bounce, playing at home, leading by eight points with eight minutes to play, you find a way to win. Cairns couldn’t and their season sits on an early precipice as they face an immediate rematch with the Breakers, who rode Lamar Patterson to finish Saturday’s stunner on a 17-5 run in less than four minutes.

The now
The Taipans will be thanking their lucky stars this Hungry Jack’s NBL season is likely to be 36 games, rather than the usual 28. It means despite all their early-season issues a 62 per cent winning record from here could still put them in the post-season. That would be the last thing on their thoughts, however, after they lost for the fourth time this year after leading or being within a basket in the final quarter.

The Breakers were -17 in their two opening quarters before heading to Cairns, but rectified that with a high-energy opening term, capped by a 9-0 run late in the period. They were then outplayed and outscored 44-27 over the next 17 minutes before the Taipans tired and Patterson wound back the clock to carry his team to victory, assisted by the Breakers’ best defensive stretch of the season and their first real crack at consistently attacking the rim.

The stats

 - The Breakers attempted 22 three-pointers and 22 free throws in Saturday’s win. In their opening two games they hoisted 74 triples compared to 30 from the charity stripe

 - The past two games between New Zealand and the Taipans have ended 85-79, with one win apiece. Ten of the Breakers’ past 11 games have seen 180 points or less, and they won eight of those. In higher scoring games last season they were 6-8

 - In their six losses, Cairns have lost the fourth terms by a combined 152-105, leaking 25.3 points per quarter compared to 21.7 in all other periods

 - In the Taipans opening-round win, Kouat Noi, Mirko Djeric and Mojave King nailed 8 triples at 62 per cent. Since then they’ve averaged 4.2 bombs at 31 per cent


The key men

Lamar Patterson – After another poor start on Saturday, Lamarvellous finally reappeared late, scoring 18 of his 22 points in the final 12 minutes as his team outscored Cairns 29-13 in that stretch. New Zealand still trailed by six with four minutes to play, but Patterson scored 9 of his team’s 11 points in the next 150 seconds to draw level and set up the W.

Where the Breakers had fallen into the trap of trying to win from range in Adelaide, Patterson took the offence by the scruff of the neck, with 19 of his points coming from ones and twos, and New Zealand hoisting just four three-point attempts in the final term as they handed Patterson the keys and he drove relentlessly into the defence.

Cam Oliver – Shot-making. Let’s be honest, it’s an artform that in Cairns is being left almost exclusively in the hands of Scott Machado, who is cutting a tired figure by the end of the Taipans’ regular down-to-the-wire contests. The Snakes superstar had chances to win games against Melbourne and NZ, but missed shots he would usually eat for breakfast.

Enter Oliver. While the all-court big man enjoys a steady diet from Machado, the Taipans need to get him in more isolation situations, and he needs to impose himself on the game in crunch time. Oliver only took two field-goal attempts in Saturday’s fourth quarter – and none in the final term against Brisbane a week earlier – and that’s inexcusable.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">?? CAMMMMMMM ONE ?<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NZBatCNS?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NZBatCNS</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NBL21?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NBL21</a> <a href="https://t.co/yzWBi0B4Av">pic.twitter.com/yzWBi0B4Av</a></p>&mdash; The NBL (@NBL) <a href="https://twitter.com/NBL/status/1357968795550187523?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 6, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

The quotes

Trust and confidence. When your coach has the former in you, it’s easy to have the latter, and the performance of Patterson in Saturday’s clash is a classic tale of that.

Up until half-time in Cairns, Lamar the Star had been anything but, shooting a crooked 8-of-29 from the field across the new season.

But with his team staring an 0-3 record squarely in the face, coach Dan Shamir did not hesitate to give the man he has “dreamed of coaching” the ball to make things happen.

“He made big plays down the stretch,” Shamir said.

“As we all know it’s a work in process. It doesn’t happen right away, and when you’re out of the game for so long, it’s not easy to jump back to this intensity.

“I’m sure he felt that more than anybody else and felt that he needed to give this kind of production and get us a win.”

While both New Zealand and Cairns were in prickly situations, it was the vast international experience of the likes of Patterson, Tai Webster, Tom Abercrombie, Finn Delany and Rob Loe that helped the Breakers hold their nerve when their hosts where losing theirs.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">How on earth has Rob gone and done that <a href="https://t.co/jC8FqvlTTZ">pic.twitter.com/jC8FqvlTTZ</a></p>&mdash; Sky Sport Breakers (@NZBreakers) <a href="https://twitter.com/NZBreakers/status/1357946400714096641?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 6, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

“Lamar and all our players are proven and experienced and have been through a lot of situations,” Shamir said.

“We need everybody to shift to the next gear, leaders first. Lamar is a big one of those.”

For Loe, it was a relief to see his team play the cohesive basketball they’re capable of.

“To come out here and get through some adversity, get some feel for the game back has been awesome,” he said.

“We just needed some time together. We had a pretty disrupted pre-season, these games being postponed hasn’t helped us, and it takes a while to shake out the cobwebs when you’ve had almost 12 months off. Hopefully we can keep improving throughout the season.”

There is no relief in sight for Cairns, who are playing quality ball in stretches, and making plenty of effort plays, but they simply haven’t found the late-game formula to deliver wins.

“We’ve played some really good basketball in both of our last two games especially … we need to do that consistently through the four quarters,” Kelly said.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">A DIME was dropped.<br><br>?<br>?<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NZBatCNS?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NZBatCNS</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NBL21?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NBL21</a> <a href="https://t.co/SuS6Jyqt0d">pic.twitter.com/SuS6Jyqt0d</a></p>&mdash; The NBL (@NBL) <a href="https://twitter.com/NBL/status/1357968026365169669?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 6, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

“I love the way our guys fought through some early mistakes as a group and toughened up, and got some stops. In the end you need to get stops and we didn’t do that in the fourth quarter.”

In reality, they let the Breakers run their sets almost unimpeded in that final quarter, not making the out-of-shape Patterson work hard for his touches, leaving energy for his match-winning burst.

Of course, 1-6 is not a place any team wants to be, yet while guard Jarrod Kenny was left on an island at times against Patterson by his team’s lack of defensive disruption, he’s upbeat about turning the result around.

“In the locker room, everyone’s still super positive,” he said.

“We know what we’re doing wrong, we’ve got to do little things better and the wins will come. Everyone’s still on board and ready to go, and is keen and eager to get up for the next one.”