Travers Has Career Night as Wildcats Beat Phoenix

Perth Wildcats NBA draft aspirant Luke Travers scored a career-high 24 points as his club overcame a slow start to end up beating South East Melbourne Phoenix 101-79 at John Cain Arena on Saturday night.

The Phoenix, who were missing four players and coach Simon Mitchell due to COVID-19 protocols, dared Travers to shoot the three-point shot and the Australian underage player took up the challenge nailing three long balls and showing his usual attack on the basket in a game-changing performance.

Travers finished with a career-high 24 points, seven rebounds and three assists while hitting 4/6 from downtown. Bryce Cotton warmed up too for 21 points and six assists with Michael Frazier and captain Jesse Wagstaff scoring 14 points apiece.

Travers said he worked hard on his shot this week and took confidence from his teammates who are encouraging him to continue to shoot.

"It was a rough week last week and I just came in every day during the week and worked on my shot. But just didn't want to settle so I tried to get on the rim, shot some free throws which is nice and I saw the ball go through the hoop so definitely help the confidence for sure," Travers said.

"Growing up and playing basketball I've never really experienced it before [teams standing off him] so it's a little bit different for me but I just try not to just settle and I've got guys around me who gave me the ball in the right spots and stuff like that. You’ve just got to stay ready."

Wildcats coach Scott Morrison said his side had issues with bad starts but their ability to recover was impressive.

"I was proud of the guys for not letting the poor start get to them. I mean, a lot has been said about it in our circles," Morrison said. 

"So it would have been easy for them to kind of say "here we go again" and get down and you know, deviate from the game plan but I thought they really dug deep. Everyone that got in gave everything they had and didn't give in and sure enough we were back in in the lead by half-time."

Xavier Munford top-scored for South East Melbourne with 18 points and three assists with Mitch Creek contributing 17 points and nine rebounds, Brandon Ashley 12 points and nine boards, and nominated replacement player Lachlan Barker 11 for his first NBL points.

Stand-in Phoenix coach Judd Flavell said his side paid dearly for turnovers and fouls in the second quarter but they were fixable issues.

"That second term was where the game was separated. We kind of lost our way. We had a few turnovers in that patch, we had maybe five turnovers or something that contributed to eight or 10 points that they had," Flavell said. 

"They also picked up loose balls and offensive rebounds that also got them cheapies and then they got to the foul line as well. Was it 10 or 12 free throws? A lot of it was late on. When we look back on the game. 

"There's a bunch of different things that we could probably nitpick on and pull apart. But it was right here in a second-quarter obviously with both ends that we needed to tidy up and we failed."

It wasn’t the homecoming the Phoenix were hoping for as they played their first game at John Cain Arena since beating Melbourne United in The Throwdown back on December 12.

They had won three straight coming into Saturday's clash with Perth and were sitting on top of the table, and despite the absence of coach Mitchell along with Reuben Te Rangi, Cam Gliddon, Dane Pineau and captain Kyle Adnam, they started impressive.

It was the first meeting between the two top four teams this season and the Phoenix were firing in the opening quarter. Eight points from Xavier Mumford saw them to a 27-15 lead at quarter-time with Phoenix newcomer Liam Barker scoring the first points of his NBL career.

That lead grew to 15 points in the second quarter but a timeout from Wildcats coach Scott Morrison stopped their momentum and gave his side a reset. Luke Travers scored 14 points and got the team going on a 21-0 run to finish the half to take 48-38 lead at half-time.

Bryce Cotton found his aim in the third quarter which made life even harder for the Phoenix but the home side did find some additional offence as Mitch Creek and Brandon Ashley knocked down some baskets.

They tried to left the team’s energy but Travers kept firing with a dunk down the lane while Majok Majok knocked down the second three-pointer of his career. Having never before attempted a triple in 143 NBL games, he's now made two in consecutive matches.

With the 'Cats leading 71-56 going into the last term, Travers made sure the Phoenix had no chance to make a late comeback taking his tally past his previous best of 19 points including an alley-oop slam from the pass from Vic Law.

The Phoenix were hit hard in the lead-up to the game with Adnam, Gliddon, Pineau and Te Rangi all forced out due to COVID-19 protocols as was coach Mitchell with respected assistant coach Judd Flavell taking charge for the night.

The Phoenix have a quick turnaround to playing the Illawarra Hawks in Wollongong on Monday while the Wildcats will play captain Jesse Wagstaff's 400th game next Saturday away to Melbourne United.

HUNGRY JACK'S NBL ROUND 10

SOUTH EAST MELBOURNE PHOENIX 79 (Munford 18, Creek 17, Broekhoff 11, Barker 11)

PERTH WILDCATS 101 (Travers 24, Cotton 21, Frazier 14, Wagstaff 14, Norton 14) 

BOX SCORE