NZ finishing the first quarter 6/7 from outside and up 30-12.
Delaney, Randle, Siva & Besson have all connected from outside.

Wetzell on a tear in the 2cnd quarter, Taipans playing single coverage and unable to stop him.
4:42 to go and NZ up 42-25.
NZ looking far better defensively this game.

Zimmerman is a disgrace

55-35 at halftime
Chasson Randle with 4 fouls but NZ's bench keeping them out in front despite Machado and Pinders efforts.

Wetzell has 17 points, 7 rebounds, 5 steals and 3 assists for the half.

Big Zim is pretty bad, I agree. Poorest hands and touch around the basket of an import of his ilk I can remember in recent times.

Yep Zimmerman ain't good. It’s hard for cairns, they just don’t have the players.

Need McCall and Machado to lift.

Is that Pinder, out there.
Or is this like the "Fine Cotton affair"

Been some great finishes this week. Think the officiating is way better than previous years. Not calling so many soft fouls this season. Similar to the NBA.

Well that finish sucked. Game needed Taipans win.

Pinder and Deng have turned into good players. Kuol the find off the year. Forde doing a fine job.
NZ played dumb after half time, good game though. Siva hogged down the stretch after playing well early.
Kuol was fouled on his last three point shot. Cairns probably should have won.

Honestly, Breakers. WTF. Wetzell's dominating and so you spend most of the last quarter jacking off the dribble 3s. Siva is elite and he reads the game so well, but he had 3 shockers IN A ROW.

How many games have the Breakers had this year with a 15-20 point lead then blown it or nearly blown it!?

Breakers could of avoided all that if they just kept feeding the ball to Wetzell in the post.

What is NZB's record since Siva recovered from injury?

Breakers tried to out-Brisbane the Bullets tonight, yikes.

NZ went away from what worked in the first half and almost choked.
Randle almost fouling out in the first half forced Siva to try and keep the scoreboard rolling over when he should have kept feeding Wetzell.

Credit to the Taipans for adjusting and making a game of it and kudos to the Breakers for holding on for dear life to notch a W.

Randle started with a bang, but I can see it's going to take some time for Siva/Randle to not just be you go/I go from three and learn to play together, even though Randle has been training with the team.

He had some flashes during the game (that block for one), but having to have Galloway out there in the final mins because of outs and fouls, was at least partly to blame for some of the craziness at the end - I'm sure he'd like to take both those 3pt attempts back, they just weren't great shots. He was far from the only one slinging them up late when they should have been putting heat on the basket, but I felt his two in particular were just not shots that should have gone up and gave the Taipans a couple of solid chances to steal the game.

For the Taipans, Pinder continues to impress me, Kuol should be RotY, and Deng was impressive - I actually thing he should have been attacking the basket even more (similar to Wetzell for NZ) because it didn't look like NZ could stop him. McCall is supremely talented but I think just a bit too careless with the ball to be a high usage player - Machado getting more mins will take care of that by itself I think.

AngusH, agree totally with your review, especially with, "McCall is supremely talented but I think just a bit too careless with the ball to be a high usage player - Machado getting more mins will take care of that by itself I think."

And McCall gets a reliable target who won't mess up his dynamic passing, which may improve his T/O's, a lot!

Galloway had great raw tools. But he needs to improve his basketball IQ and strength. If he can do that he can be a very good NBL player at both ends.

What is NZB's record since Siva recovered from injury?

NZ are a far better team with Siva on the floor but they also missed WMW's energy and scoring punch especially when Randle was had to sit with 4 fouls in the first quarter.
Hopefully Abercrombie is back sooner rather than later.

I thought Machado looked cooked. That last possession was woeful. Cairns are better without him, and Bul at the point.

Sorry I meant Randle had 4 fouls in the first half no quarter...

Randle only had 3. This was corrected at half time

Think I mighta got one in on that last play, where Machado couldn't