Breakers should get this one.
Webster & Abercrombie both have their jumpshots locked in and Jacksons passing game has been on point. Charles Jackson is showing what Vickerman was talking about and Pledger has been improving with each game.
Vukona should be playing some minutes but I believe Wesley won't travel while he recovers from having his appendix removed.

Cadee will need to be handcuffed as will Khazzouh and Harrington but if NZ can keep those 3 taking contested shots it will go a long way towards victory.

It's very hard to see Sydney win games when they don't play the full 40 minutes. They play great in spurts, but then have a tendency to throw all their good work away with sequences of brainless offence (i.e. bombing from outside or taking rushed decisions - stop playing through Khazzouh).

With that being said, they're a very dangerous team because if they hit those outside shots they can beat anyone.

Defensively, they need to make a big stride as they have given up 96, 94 and 99 points in their last 3 games.

Tipping Breakers by 2.

The x-factor is that it's Al Harrington's last game, he'll probably be looking to go off with a big one. His last performance was ominous enough against Adelaide.

I remember Patty Mills had struggled in the games leading up to his final NBL showing in Adelaide and then went off, although NZ's defence is a completely different proposition to Adelaide!

Still, I think the Breakers will have to be on to get this one. They need to get Sydney's PGs off their game, because if Khazzouh and Harrington get good supply in good spots they'll be hard to stop.

MACDUB is spot on though, NZ play the best part of 40mins most nights and the Kings rarely have.

I will be at the game tonight. Although we have beaten NZ at home before, I must say that I don't like our chances particularly. Hoping the O can continue on from last week, and hopefully effort on D and the glass will be there. I suppose I can live with a loss as long as there is some fight and effort.

NZ are a bad matchup for us. Cadee/Thornton guarding Webster/Jackson... Need Big Al to go out with a bang if we are a chance.

NZ have been playing the twin towers of Alex Pledger & Charles Jackson together a bit lately to try and dominate the rebounds and rim protection with Corey Webster and Abercrombie on the wings to spread the floor and give Ced Jackson some lanes to drive. It worked well against Perths imposing front court and will most likely be tried against the Kings with Wesley out and Vukona playing limited minutes.

Paul Adelaide's defense against Harrington was extremely poor. Either no hand up or giving him open shots for 3. I imagine NZ will play a lot better defense against him and make it a tough night.

I think NZ will be too good for Sydney. The odds should be more like $1.30. Having said all that it means that Sydney will win :)

Sometimes I bet on player under/over total points. I wouldn't do it in this game due to the players being too inconsistent but just for fun

Harrington under 19.5 points
Thornton over 16.5 points
Webster under 24.5 points
Abercrombie under 16.5

It will probably go 0/4

Breakers with ease. Kings are a shambles, dont let the win against Adelaide fool you, they haven't beaten and consistently well performing teams. The Breakers get down to work and play the whole 40minutes. $1.65 is a real surprise but ill take it ;)

KingJames, I actually wondered if someone should build an app for bragging rights bets (no money involved) with friends. Every bet would be head-to-head or under-vs-over.

So maybe you and I pick the game total for this game. I say 190, you say 178. It auto-adjusts to the mid-point so I have 184 and up you have 184 and down. Right on 184 is a split pot.

With good execution, I could see it taking off amongst groups of friends or online communities.

Brilliant idea Isaac! That would be something Id get behind. Problem is when certain types get it wrong and start claiming they pressed the wrong button hahaha

Isaac, I agree that would be a good app.

A smaller idea could be with NBL tipping you get a fake $1000 to bet on games throughout the year and there will be a leader board for that. There would have to be a minimum amount of bets over the season (say 10) before someone could officially be apart of the leader board to stop people just betting all the money once or twice and end up on top of the ladder.

We will make the world gamblers one app at a time!

I like that idea KingJames, I'm sure a betting company would sponsor it too!

Yeah, no faith in the Kings winning this one. NZ are back to firing on all cylinders, should take this out.

I reckon Markovic is Kahzzouh's favourite guy on the team with all the service he gets

Just checked the half-time stats, was wondering how NZ had 28 rebounds when SYD had only missed 15 shots then noticed the O boards - NZ are killing them.

Just wondering, if this is Childress's suspension game which is what I'm sure I heard the commentator say, how is it that Sydney get to play with two imports?

That Jackson injury looks serious. Reminds me of when Rose did his knee.

paul, it happened just as we said. Massive lapse in the 4th and completely went away from what they were doing.

Think ive found the issue - PG. Cadee doesn't take over and control the offence in those sticky situations. The ship goes rudderless and you have Garlepp, Khazzouh, Cadee going iso with no offence. Cadee needs to be a floor general instead of allowing it to turn into a shambolic mess.

That's a really good question re. the Childress suspension. How can he sit out suspended and the Kings play 2 imports? Doesn't sound right to me.

Another limp 4th quarter. Khazzouh had a stinker. Sometimes the team doesn't go to him for so long on offence that he gets out of rhythm.

Cadee's stat line from this one probably looks ok but he failed to control the game, especially when NZ took control in the 4th.

What position is Carter even playing? He's like a shooting guard that barely shoots.

Im pretty sure Adelaide already has but he is going to a pretty fun looking situation. Joey Wright or Rasheed Wallace and Brandon Roy hmmmmm

But you're only allowed 2 imports on your active roster. Childress was on injury waiver, but surely you can't be on injury waiver when you sit out a suspension???

One would have thought you'd have to be activated to the playing roster and then sit out 2 games for the suspension, meaning you can only play one import for those two games.

What an insipid final 6.5 minutes. Big time choke.

Cadee had some bad shots down the stretch tonight, but NZ made their shots down the stretch and that was the major difference. Disappointing, but not unexpected...

Credit where credit is due NZ shot awesome in that final period. Most of it was good defense just Webster and Bartlett were even better.

3/4 in my points tips

Another tough pill to swallow, especially with Jackson and Jackson on the bench, and Vikona on 4 fouls with 5 minutes to go. Should have gone inside to Harrington or Kazzouh to get that last foul on Vikona. But our offence seems to be shoot the 3 pointer with no rebounders in sight.

Spot on MACDUB, I wrote a story on Cadee this week and he was very open that he has to get better at. He does it at times and the team looks good, and at others he just lets the flow of the game control what the team does.

BTW that was an ominous performance from Pledger, owned Khazzouh defensively, controlled the boards, changed shots and finished plays offensively. If he gets back to his best form consistently it's going to be hard for anyone to beat NZ with the talent they have elsewhere.

A point about Charles Jackson that gets overlooked is just how fast he runs the split line. When he runs he's probably the fastest bigman in the league (PF or C), which can help NZ considerably. How often can you say a bigman is the reason a team decides to run? Considering the athletes and shooters NZ have, a 4-5 who can run and create early offence is an absolute luxury and something they haven't had in their five-six year reign that I can recall

Yeah, Pledger was huge and had me thinking several times that here was a bench player owning a highly rated starter.

The Kings really seem to be off with the fairies at times and seem to have no game plan...when that mode sets in both offence and defence have huge issues and they play without purpose or heart. If that doesn't come back to coaching, I don't know what does. I'm no fan of Heal but he put some fight into the team while now... insipid is the word that keeps coming to mind.

"Yeah, Pledger was huge and had me thinking several times that here was a bench player owning a highly rated starter. "

Fair call but before injury Pledger was considered a highly rated starter, obviously not on this forum but in other circles he was rated. Time off allows people to forget how truly effective he is at protecting the rim and crashing the offensive glass.

Yup Charles Jackson gets up and down the floor quick and a couple of times a game Ced Jackson is tossing the ball ahead high above the opposition guards and finding him in the paint. He doesn't always finish but that is improving as is his team chemistry.

NZ still have Tai Wesley to come back who was playing some of his best basketball before the birth of his child and appendix operation.

Think ive found the issue - PG. Cadee doesn't take over and control the offence in those sticky situations. The ship goes rudderless and you have Garlepp, Khazzouh, Cadee going iso with no offence. Cadee needs to be a floor general instead of allowing it to turn into a shambolic mess.

Exactly... I was hoping that Markovic would be filling this role this season and help ease Jase into it and lead by example, but BUH BOW... And only < 5 mins for Steve last night as well, so obviously not 100?
The wheels well and truly fell off, NZ made a couple of big time shots and then it all fell apart and everyone was taking idiotic/quick shots, no plays were run, no defence, ugh... Lack of leadership was a huge problem the last couple of seasons and that's not going to get fixed with a young aussie like Cadee who is still more a SG than a PG and a SG import that they want to be a PG but who can't even give it up to another player on the fast break for an alley oop...

Another tough pill to swallow, especially with Jackson and Jackson on the bench, and Vikona on 4 fouls with 5 minutes to go. Should have gone inside to Harrington or Kazzouh to get that last foul on Vikona. But our offence seems to be shoot the 3 pointer with no rebounders in sight.

I reckon both of them were on 4 fouls for most of the 4th quarter... youd' think that nearly every time the Kings took it inside and got a proper play instead of just spinning and chucking, they either got the easy basket or got fouled, but they refused to do anything other than take (often early) silly shots...

The Kings really seem to be off with the fairies at times and seem to have no game plan...when that mode sets in both offence and defence have huge issues and they play without purpose or heart. If that doesn't come back to coaching, I don't know what does.

As above re: wheels falling off, but in addition to this, where are all the people who spoke up last week when the Kings won, saying how amazing a coach Cotter is and that he shouldn't shoulder any of the blame? They're probably still spouting the same old crap about "Chill has been injured", "He didn't pick the players"... But a quality coach inspires the players, instils in them the tools and processes that they can fall back on when the wheels fall off, and doesn't make consistently poor and uninspired decisions during the game...


Seriously though, so how does a professional team get outrebounded nearly 2:1? I was talking to Ben Knight after the game and suggested that we should have suited him up and gotten him to get some rebounds and he looked seriously disheartened with their rebounding effort... "Can only try to teach them so much, but you've got to want to get them..." And Jeromie with no game time and he's one of the few that seems to actually want to get after them... Looks like he's got the Cody Ellis seat on the Kings bus this season with Coach Cotter...

Also, as a side note re: Jules's lack of impact on the game, and not to take away from Pledger's solid effort (I agree he's had some quality bitch-making games against us in the past as well!) I talked to Jules after the game as I saw that he'd pulled up sore on the bench at times and he said that he got a cork in the first quarter and couldn't feel his leg all game, so that's got to have some effect...

There are 30-odd minutes to fill at PF now with Harrington gone so I'm sure Hill will get back into the rotation.

I don't know what the expectation was for Al's minutes, but if it was an open book I think he should have been played less and Hill used as energy off the bench. Or sit Khazzouh down when he's being manhandled and put Hill at C.

Still, the Kings' defence the past two games has been much better, and they'd have to be confident with Childress coming back in that they can post winning scores and defend them.

Having said that, they've just played two of the easier teams in the league to zone and Illawarra are next up, so that will really test where the D is at.