LACEY LOWDOWN

“This is our first time in this kind of rodeo together”

From Murray McKinnon

Melbourne United head coach Dean Demopolous was philosophical and gracious in his reflections on the game in the post-match interview following the SKYCITY Breakers 2-0 sweep of Melbourne on Saturday.

“It was a hotly contested game and I’m just really proud of my guys man,this is our first time at this kind of rodeo together. It was a hotly contested game and I’m just really proud of my guys man. Eight new players, this group here (Breakers) has been through it before and they’re an excellent basketball team, they deserve the word champion to be by their names they earn it they talk it and they walk it, give them credit they’re better than us right now.”

“We aspire to be like them we’d like to hang up four out of five years champion banners, and they’ve got an excellent chance to make it five out of six in my opinion, but my team set a bar and a standard for this new franchise and their city embraced them, fans embraced them, ownership management embraced them, they took me on a hell of a ride and I’m appreciative of the opportunity that ownership and management gave me to spend a lot of time with a group of guys like this it’s one of the best group people I’ve ever been around and they made me better and we feed off each other and we’re going to try to come back stronger and better for it.”

“We congratulate New Zealand and wish them all the best going forward, in fact I’m rooting for them,” said Demopolous.

Chris Goulding who top scored with 23 points for Melbourne said that it hurt not making the final.
“We tried as hard as we could, but probably didn’t play our best game.”

“Where ever we finished at the end of the regular season, it doesn’t change how much this hurts so I wouldn’t say we were a dominant team all year we fought some massive games out to get and put ourselves in the best position possible which we did but at the end of the day that still wasn’t good enough. New Zealand hit their straps at the right time, they’re playing very good basketball,” said Goulding.

Dean Vickerman “Any win right now is a good win for us.” 

By Murray McKInnon

The drought is over, the Breakers finally got a win on the board with a 77-74 home victory over the Townsville Crocodiles at the Vector Arena on Friday night.

But they had to battle it out over the final two and a half minutes after Corey Webster with a three pointer had given them an 11 point buffer going into the final stanza.
Clint Steindl sparked a revival for the Crocodiles with six straight points and Nicholas Kay gave them further hope with a three and two free throws. Mika Vukona sitting on four fouls, determined not let it slip away, made two quick layups and Tom Abercrombie came in a with a free throw and a two point shot to clinch it for the Breakers in front of a crowd of 5562.

Scores were locked at 22 a piece after the first quarter where Abercrombie, from the free throw line, in the opening seconds of the game gained the two points he needed to become the Breakers all-time leading scorer surpassing Kirk Penney’s 2,517 points. Abercrombie playing in his 215th game for the Breakers top scored with 22. Charles Jackson with 15 points and 15 rebounds, Cedric Jackson on 13 and Corey Webster 12 were the other top contributors to the win.
The Breakers led 38-36 at the half and at the end of the three-quarter the teams were level again at 52-52.

It was a relieved and smiling Dean Vickerman who fronted the media after the game.
“Any win right now is a good win for us, we built a solid lead and everything that possibly could happen kind of happened in that last part, a number of offensive rebounds, foul a three point shooter, a push off on an inbound pass, there were a number of things that happened that didn’t help us close that thing out, but we held our nerve and we’re really happy to get the win,” said Vickerman.
“The message got through that we wanted to foul, we fouled, we did it right, we questioned the last one, there’s four and a half seconds to go, do you foul that one, but it worked out,” he added.

Vickerman said after six straight losses confidence was down a bit coming into the game.
“After some losses like we’ve had there’s just that little edge off your confidence and we showed that a little bit tonight, but to get through that one and now we keep building and we’re back to 500 and we move on to Adelaide.
“I thought we had some patches where we blew the game and got out to a good margin, that end of the third quarter wasn’t good for us where they made a little come back. I kept my time out there and wanted to see how long we could play that group that we put in at the start of the fourth quarter and they pretty much played the whole game out, Mika played the whole quarter with four fouls, I though Charles was the best of our bigs and kept him out there. Corey struggled the first half but he came through with some key shots. I thought Tommy was outstanding most of the night and Ced just drove us tonight and it was really important his attack on the rim was outstanding play and to get Charles to action that dump down the stretch,” said Vickerman.

The coach was also pleased to see Abercrombie reach a milestone of scoring for the Club.
“There’s been some amazing players play for this Club and for him to be top of the scoring list and with a long career to go it will be interesting to see how far he can take that record” he said
Vickerman left it to Cedric Jackson to comment on Charles Jackson.
“Charles really watches a lot of film that’s a great learning tool from the guys he’s been learning from and he’s always trying to find a way to be a spark and he was definitely that tonight and with his energy he’s the best communicator on court all night. We talk a lot but he drove everything tonight and he’s getting his confidence back and learning how to defend certain players, he’s just got this little thing of get your hand out of the cookie jar. Alex Pledger’s also playing great right now and as long as we can just continue to build on that and stay focussed,” said Cedric.

Going forward Vickerman said it was a nice little bit of relief but there is still more work to do.

“Go in there and play to get the win and see what happens happens, we tick this one off we’re back to 500 and we’re 12 and 12 and we’ve four to go and we know it’s two at home and two on the road and one of the things we haven’t been able to do this year so far is be a really good team on the road and if we want to make the finals we going to have to do that, it’s a great test for us right now.”

Asked if he was disappointed at losing Townsville coach Shawn Dennis said if anything he was pleased with the effort his team showed.
“I don’t think it’s disappointing when you look at you’re playing New Zealand in New Zealand who are four times champion in five years, and we’re the youngest team in the League and spend out the least amount of money in the League, to come back into it like that shows the guts and determination of this group so I’m actually extremely proud. You want to win on the scoreboard but we’re still learning how to win and against the Breakers, there’re three teams in this League, that if you don’t win the possession game, it’s very difficult to beat and that’s Adelaide, Illawarra and New Zealand and we had 17 turnovers and gave up 20 offensive boards and that’s the ball game and then you miss 12 free throws on top of that it’s actually a miracle we were within three, so from that point of view to do that and still have a chance to win the game I’m extremely proud of this group, that’s a great effort and I think people need to realise what a hell of an effort that is against New Zealand.

“They’re four times champions when they know they need to perform in general they always do and they did today, they threw everything they had at us and they only got us by three and that’s an incredible effort by our blokes and I’m extremely proud of them”, said Dennis.

He added that he was impressed with the Breakers play.
“They’re a good shooting team and they can get second chance goes at it and that gives them confidence to shoot the ball and that’s what happened in the fourth quarter, they dominated us in that area and in the last part of the quarter we started to take care of it. And that’s when we were able to edge our way back in and were able to set up a couple of good plays and there’s no secret in basketball that your defence is the thing that creates good offensive opportunities and poise within your team and we started to get that done and overall we weren’t too bad defensively we kept them under 80 points which I think is a very good effort but you just can’t give up all that possession, it just kills you in the end,” said Dennis.
“Our aim is to get to 12 wins if we can and win the rest of our home games and it means we’ve had another improvement after a tough off-season,” he added.

Career high 40 points for Kevin Lisch

By Murray Mckinnon
The SKYCITY Breakers let a much needed win against the Illawarra Hawks slip from their grasp in a double overtime thriller at Vector Arena on Sunday.
With the score at 80-77 with seconds remaining in regulation time, Mika Vukona stepped up for two free throws which he missed. Then instead of immediately fouling, the Breakers left Cody Ellis clear to launch a three pointer that sank locking the score up at 80 all and sending the game into overtime.
Cory Webster hit a three at the start of the next five minutes of play but Kevin Lisch responded for the Hawks with a couple from the charity stripe a field goal and a three. Tai Wesley came back with four points and Charles Jackson had the Breakers ahead by two only to have Lisch sneak in for a lay up to lock the scores at 89 apiece.
Lisch immediately sunk a three with Webster responding. Lisch then came into his own at the free throw line with six points and despite Webster gaining another two from the free throw Jarrad Weeks delivered the final nail in the coffin with two from the charity stripe to give the Hawks a 103-96 victory.
Coach of the Breakers Dean Vickerman was not impressed with his team’s play in the final seconds of regular time.
“We struggle as a coaching staff just to get past the last ten seconds of regulation and we broke a team rule, when we had the opportunity to foul and that’s what we do in that situation and we didn’t and you pay the price for it to allow them to get a three that was contested and everything, but they shouldn’t even be shooting that basketball it should be shooting two right now (from the free throw) instead of making that three and going into overtime. We talk about it, we made improvements, we did some things better, but that’s just totally against who we are and what we believe in and what our rules are as a team and I thought we had about three opportunities to get it done to foul, they made three passes so that’s where we lost the game.”

After three previous losses to the Hawks this season the Breakers came out with a vengeance and dominated the first quarter to lead 32-24. Tai Wesley was on target from the perimeter and Alex Pledger was superb under the post with eight points in quick succession.
“We were well prepared for the game and for whatever they threw at us and it took three games to get well prepared for this team because they do change things a lot and do disrupt and do a lot of different things.
“There were so many things we did better especially just the intent to start with and I thought our organisation was great I thought the boys were huddling, we played at a pace we like to play at and got good contributions from a lot of people and we just seemed like we were really together and on point and again to me it’s just a shame that we spoilt it for it with that one play,” said Vickerman.
The Breakers went to the break leading 53-48 and were still leading at the three quarter 71-65, but then the Hawks got on top of the game in the fourth to come back with a run of ten unanswered points.

Coach of the Hawks Rob Beveridge said they have been working on their defence in recent weeks and that’s what got then there in the end.
“The Breakers dictated the whole first quarter it was their quarter they came out and that’s what I was expecting the Breakers to do. For us to have three games of 20 plus point wins I was shocked with that and thinking to myself we’re going to come to an arena that’s going to be loud (attendance 6309) and they’re going to throw everything at us and they did that and I thought they were the better team early but once we started to actually play some great defence I thought we were very very good and I look at some of the shots that Abercrombie made and Webster they were late on the clock right on the buzzer and we can’t do much about that but we made them really work for it and as the game went on obviously we shut them down from our defence which is what we have been working on. The first half of the season we were very average and so I’m pretty pleased with that,” he said.
“It was a hell of a game, I don’t know what the fans expect but that was just a wow factor for fans watching, it was a battle, it was a real grind it was an arm wrestle, there was some great basketball out there. It was almost the survival of the fittest at the end, just look at the body language of the players how bad it was. So it came down to that mental grind and what we’re looking forward to is if we’re going to make the play offs that’s the type of grind it’s going to be and I think we ticked the box on that tonight,” added Beveridge.

Vickerman said they were aware of the challenge going into the game.
“We went into the game talking about the challenge we had in front of us how you want to beat every team in the League and to not have done that this year that hurts us as a group in that we couldn’t quite find a way to beat everyone in this League and I hope we get another opportunity to,” he said.
Vickerman did however acknowledge the win by Illawarra.
“They’re a good team and they kept fighting they never give up and they showed why they are one of the best teams in the League tonight the way they kept fighting back.”

Lisch who had a career high of 40 points said it was an enjoyable game.
“That was a long game, it was enjoyable just in the fact that there were so many ups and downs throughout the game. You think you lose, you think you win, it just goes back and forth and both teams just played really hard and we’re fortunate enough down the stretch to hit some big shots, Cody (Ellis) hit some huge shots for us. It was just a fun win which really we needed.”
The Sunshine Swing is coming up for the Breakers (Townsville on Thursday and Cairns on Saturday) and Vickerman said that the team has to start to show that they are a playoff team after suffering four straight losses.
Beveridge feels that the Breakers will make the playoffs.
“This is a winning Club it’s as simple as that. I’ve no doubt and I’ve always said that Perth and New Zealand are the two best teams and for us actually beating four zero in the series is just amazing it really is and don’t think anybody would ever think that Illawarra could do that. But the Breakers they’re champions, they know how to win, they’ve got a group out there and I know that they’ll be fighting their backsides off for the playoffs for sure.”

Webster top scored for the Breakers with 22, Cedric Jackson 18 and Alex Pledger and Tom Abercrombie scored 12. Lisch’s 40 was backed up with 18 from Ellis, 15 from Andrew Ogilvy and 14 from Kirk Penney who did not play the fourth quarter.
“Kirk Penney cramped up pretty bad (in the hamstring) in that final quarter and the thing is at the end of the day he’s 35 years of age and we’ve still got lots of games ahead of us. This game tonight of course we want to win but I don’t want to put our players long term future in doubt so we pulled him and we’ll get treatment for him and the last thing we’ll do is rush him back, if it is anything worse than a cramp or strain whatever it might be,” said Beveridge.

From Murray McKinnon

It was sweet revenge for the Breakers, after losing in controversial circumstances by one point two weeks ago in Melbourne, to come away with a solid fourth quarter slog to beat Melbourne 80-69 at Vector Arena on Sunday.

It was billed as the grudge match between point guards Corey Webster and Melbourne’s Chris Goulding and Goulding definitely got plenty of ribbing from the vocal 6749 spectators in attendance.
However Webster was the star of the show, scoring nearly half of the Breakers’ points, with a season league high of 39 which included seven from the outer perimeter.

The first quarter Melbourne with a couple of threes from Stephen Holt and Daniel Kickert went out to a 15-9 lead before Webster went on a run with three straight field goals, a bucket from Charles Jackson and then a three pointer from Webster followed by three from the free throw stripe to suddenly have the score at 23-18. At the end of the quarter the Breakers led 23-22.

Webster did not start in the second quarter but was brought in after a time out when Melbourne took a hold with Holt proving spark in the backcourt. Tom Abercrombie showed a couple of good plays with a three and a quick lay-up. Melbourne went to the half time leading 35-32 and they led at the three quarter 52-51. Webster then took control in the final ten minutes with a lesson in three point shooting.

Asked if it was a bit of a pay-back time Webster said it was the win he was after more than anything else.
“That was in the back of my mind, ever since it happened but honestly I wasn’t really thinking about that during the game I was just trying to help the team where ever I could and to get the win and luckily I shot the ball well,” said Webster.
“It was satisfying beating them tonight, they’re at the top of the league right now and that’s where we want to be and we’re working our way up there so it was a good win for us.
“I had great screens from my team mates that’s all it is really. When you had a couple you start to feel good about yourself and the rim seems like it gets a bit bigger, but it’s credit to my team mates for getting me so open and when you’re that open at this level most people make wide open shots.
“We’ve always want to protect our home court and now that we’ve got a road win we can keep building on that,” he added.

Coach of Melbourne Dean Demopoulos was gracious in defeat, saying that he has a lot of respect for the Breakers and didn’t think that they had come out fired up because of what had happened in their previous game.

“I don’t think that had anything to do with it, they’re champions of the League and they’ve been perennial champions. Four out of five years they come out pretty fired up by nature, that’s one of the elements of who they are. You’ve got to beat this team, they’re the reigning champions. They’ve got the cup (trophy) and everyone else is thirsty,” said a personable Demopoulos.

He conceded that Webster was the key to the Breakers victory.
“Much too much Corey Webster tonight. He’s a terrific player and made some tough shots, I thought we defended him okay for the majority of the time but he made some terrific shots, they got him open they went to him and that’s what champions do.

“I thought it was two pretty good teams knocking heads more than anything else. And one team that’s done a whole lot more together than the other team and that’s the reason why you look up and it looks like San Antonio here. The banners they tell you why you’re in the kind of fight you’re in.
“By the way I loved it here, terrific City, I wasn’t here long but I had a chance just to walk around briefly and looks like you celebrate your team and back it and you got a good product, hats off.
“It’s not a rivalry situation yet between the two teams, we’ve got to win some games and get into the type of post season play that they (Breakers) do before it becomes a rivalry, I think right now it’s pretty one sided,” he said.

Former NBA assistant Demopoulos was asked if Webster is in the same mould as NBA shooter Steph Curry.
“That’s a good analogy, he was tonight. There’s a lot of fine players in this league, but Corey’s at the top of the list for sure and that was a great, great performance. I’ve seen Kobe (Bryant) get 60, and I’ve seen players get high numbers but Corey’s 39 was quiet, very efficient and he had a hell of a game,” said Demopoulos.

Dean Vickerman coach of the Breakers said it was timely for Webster to shine.
“I thought at different times it was one of those grind of a games, but Corey did a hell of a job defensively too and that’s something we spoke about, out of him or Goulding who’s going to play the best defence and I thought Corey did a hell of a job there. Both teams were struggling to score and Corey worked hard to get open and that’s one of the things he’s doing right now he’s sprinting off screens, people are screening well for him, creating enough separation to get clean looks and he obviously shot the hell out of the three ball tonight.

“We put Corey at the point guard as Ced wasn’t a hundred percent tonight and we went back to the group that closed out the game at Sydney the other night and he did really good job of getting a mixture of run and play for himself and his team mates and I thought that was another evolution of his game in being able to dictate what happens at the offensive end,” said Vickerman.

“Ced made some amazing lay ups tonight, his reverse lay ups, kiss off the glass high, we know he’s a brilliant player even not at hundred percent he put in a hell of a performance. I thought Pledger was really good and he continues to come on and that was a big post move for him and he hasn’t had a lot of those opportunities but it was a key time for him to go in, just back Warwick (Hakim) in and make a key bucket there.
“We still didn’t rebound as well as we wanted to against this team, Majok got to the offensive glass too much for my liking, the other goals we set ourselves tonight was to hold them under 30 percent from the three point line and that went a long way to helping us get the win tonight.
“Mika, that was his best game of the year, when we needed him he came up with key offensive rebounds he made his own little post moves and as the season wears along he’s going to get more touches in the post and be more aggressive as well. Get Ced healthy, get Mika healthy, get Wesley back and get our combinations together again we’ve got to just keep building, it’s massive for us we’ve got a Perth series to finish off over there and then back here so it’s going to be a key series and certainly one we want to win,” he added.

Maintaining a clean record on the home court is also a key priority for Vickerman.

“I stress to the guys how important winning at home is and now that we have six in a row we’ve just got to keep building on it, I’ve got to stop it with timeouts when I feel like that we’re letting it down, because we just can’t let anything go at home it’s going to be so important to your record and how you finish the end of the year,” said Vickerman.

Cedric Jackson scored 10 for the Breakers and Abercrombie 9. Goulding top scored for United with 19, Holt was on 17 and Kickert 13.
Majok with eight points was philosophical after their latest loss.
“We’ve lost three games in a row, but I think we’re going to be alright. Everybody’s coming for us because of the great start that we have had so we’ve just got to regroup and come back even stronger,” said Majok.

The Breakers play Perth in Perth on Friday night and then the return game against Perth is at the North Shore Events Centre on Wednesday 2 December.