Nice little Wednesday double for the fans at home

Aokuso out for 'a few rounds' with a foot injury as per the WNBL website. Townsville will miss her when going up against Southside’s frontline.

See if Sydney can get 5 guards on the court simultaneously this weekend.

Seebohm outcoached Chambers big time in Townsville. LJ's post magic made the Southside offence look functional at times but they really struggled outside of that, especially with outside shooting and turnovers. I never really was a Steph Reid fan before but am appreciating her craft more now. She made the two Roccis look very ordinary in comparison.

Perth by 4 at halftime, nice game. Very sparse crowd.

Great 1/4, flames by 1 at 3/4. Willoughby on fire.

Top 4 at the end of season pretty much locked in already.

Pretty sloppy game by the Lynx, but I enjoyed that 4th quarter.

Lynx just hit to many threes in the last few minutes, flames were a little unlucky imo.

Sydney cannot afford to have Heal and Panousis go a combined 0/8 from three. If the two of them aren't shooting well, they don't really bring anything else to the game. Also lots of one on one inefficient offence from Willoughby and Heal - surprised Froling and even Sjerven didn't have more plays run for them. Sydney's pressing defence gave up too many open shots in the final quarter and Perth made them pay.

Sami Whitcomb's one footed three pointer was a great highlight.

I didn't get to see the game. How was Mangakahia? Seems like she's just finding her feet in the league.

Played better d but offense not there. Whitcomb sort of gave her a lesson early on.

Yeah, only Flames' 2nd game so give her some time.
6 boards was handy from someone marginally taller than Scherf's kneecaps.

I thought Mangakahia was one of their better players. Again imo I thought the subbing down the stretch hurt flames, they were right in it till then.

Heal has two guards that cannot operate without the ball in their hands, he switched Shyla to the point against Perth and Mangakahia was lost waiting on the wing. Going to be a long season for Sydney.

3 rounds in...

Opals 23/24 front runners?

Whitcomb - Reid
Talbot - Wallace - Melbourne
Allen - Blicavs or Maley or both*
Magbegor - Smith or Garbin or both*
Tolo - George

*1 or the other
Personally, I'd drop Garbin if chosen right now.


Other options
Heal
Mangakahia
Lavey
Shelley
Wehrung
Madgen
Nicholson
Kunek
Froling
Griffin
Aokuso
Scherf
Jackson - stated retired internationally but never know.


Newcomer options, potential asia cup spot mid next year
Amoore
Borlase
Swain
Atwell
Horvat
Bibby

After watching most of these teams now, it's clear the standard is well below par for what you should expect from a "national" competition.
Better standard in many NBL1 teams, especially the guards , early days for sure, but can’t see it improving,
Sydney and Canberra are woeful, Bendigo and Townsville probably looking the most together but nothing really impressive about either .

The WNBL online boxscore is giving assists to Shyla Heal from made free throws lol. Is this a thing the WNBL are doing now or do we have some Heal fanpeople on the scoring bench?

Is that not a standard FIBA thing?
(If not it should be)

If you get fouled on a shot and you make either free throws, the passer gets an assist.

I don't think I've ever noticed it before? I'm aware of the concept but I didn't think anybody currently did it.

The Flames' offence is absolutely dreadful. Adelaide is playing good defence but I don't think Heal at the point is working out very well atm.

Bee in for at least five years.

I'm watching the nbl, which Heal, coach or player or both.

Well I just checked a random European game play by play I watched during the week and it turns out they do credit assists for free throws. There you go, I learned something new today.

Willoughby is having a shocker statistically but can't really blame her individually as the Flames on offence are looking a bit headless chicken. In the meantime, Adelaide is shooting 63% from three lol. The Flames are simply not a good defensive team.

I was referring to Shyla playing point guard but Shane Heal isn't having a great one either. No effective adjustments to disrupt Adelaide at both ends of the court. Adelaide are just doing what they want with ease.

Smashed 'em

Mansfield 7/7 from outside the arc was pretty special

The NBL has been doing assists on free throws for decades, FIBA adopted it a few years ago.

Goodchild now with the boomers... just increasing the depth in the backcourt.

Sydney & Canberra anxiously scanning the fixtures for when they play each other.
(The answer: December 10th)

WNBL.com.au doing a fine job as usual ... the standings haven't been updated since Wednesday :/

Problems all over the place.
Collier-hill stock certainly sliding...

I thought Wallace looked good at point guard today. Then again, it was against Canberra defence, which makes Penina Davidson look like Sylvia Fowles so maybe not the best opponent to measure performances by.

The Sydney vs Canberra game will be one to look out for. On talent, Sydney should win but they're shooting and defending so poorly so who knows.

Watched the Boomers on 9now for the first time this week after seeing the first two games on ESPN and the other live, it was...tough. Every aspect of the telecast is just amateurish. That Nathan fella has some passion but is a terrible play by play man. Scores were sometimes 3 possessions behind the play. Single camera, looks like it's shot on a Nokia.