It won't be an RAC doubleheader.

I'll take whatever I can get as far as being able to attend both

It should work out.

Has Petrik got money on Perth to lose? How absolutely stupid to have Wilson & LA off at the start of the 4th quarter!!!

And the loser is Perth.

Well that half went about as bad as it possibly could have for the Flames.
Down 23 and Swain straight back to the rooms with an injury. Really hoping it's not a major one :(

Sami doing MVP things.

Any update on Swain injury? Big loss for already underwhelming Flames

Strapped up and back on.

Doesn't look good.
Started the 2nd half, lasted 30 seconds, then headed to the bench in tears. Left knee now iced up and she has the warmup top on.

Started the quarter but back off and in warm up shirt

Would have been a better semifinal series if Canberra replaced Sydney...

Bendigo vs Sydney has really captured the attention of sporting public .

The public doesn't know about it, and judging by its own website I don't think the league even knows about it


--

I'm still hanging out for some positive news about Swain's knee.

I wish the first PER one was blank.

The public doesn't know about it, and judging by its own website I don't think the league even knows about it

Those are typically local times so I'm guessing it's still displaying the original 5pm WST tip-off time, though I was told they were hoping to announce the new non-clashing time today, so hopefully 5pm becomes the EDT time (and hopefully it doesn't become a moot issue tomorrow evening)

Game two shows 6.30 and it's showing up on my phone calender as 3.30, which means either it's EDT or someone's put the wrong info somewhere.

But yes, game three will be at 2pm WST.

I can't make it so moot point personally, but it would be good to get an email if the time has changed. Waiting until result tomorrow feels very last minute if families are having to plan their weekend.

The app says 4.30 tonight, so I guess it's the calendar that's wrong.

Weird that they've not publicised the new tipoff for G3.

Townsville go from 11 down to 5 up, and it's only quarter time!

That early, wasteful second foul from Amihere was surely a major factor in the momentum shift.

Amihere stepping up with not one but two trademark stupid fouls in the first half

The traditional end to the Lynx season: getting absolutely wiped off the floor. It is at least less frustrating to have it happen now than game three of a grand final.

Pathetic.

And the loser is, Perth

Lynx bench got shown up tonight with Clinch-Hoycard & Morrell not up to the standard of quality bigs in a WNBL Semifinal, they offered nothing offensively & both are hopeless defensively. The decision to continue to play Attwell at 30 - 40% capacity backfired & really she should have been told to go have surgery early & focus on next year. At some point Maley & Sowah have to realise it's a team game & need to become less selfish players who continue to jack up ridiculous shots! Unless Petrik is going to put any focus on how his teams defend defensively they’ll only ever continue to make up the numbers.

They've been a missed free throw away from a championship twice in three years, WTF are you talking about?

You want to live in the past & dream about what could have been FFS koberulz? I'm talking about this version of the Lynx who had many flaws team wise & individually that got fully exposed against the Fire!

You're the one suggesting there's a trend.

SamCro has had an irrational hate boner for Maley & Sowah for quite a while now, pay it no mind.
(Not sure who he/she thinks should be taking the shots when Amihere is stewing on the bench and Atwell isn't healthy. Going with a couple of all-WNBL team members as the main support for Wilson seems like a pretty logical option to me. When someone is shooting 54% while the rest of the team is going 34%, if anything they should be shooting more, not less)

Personally I'm also plenty happy with Petrik, who consistently gets excellent production per dollar from his rosters. I don't recall his contract status but I'd re-sign him in an instant if it was up.

Didn't think tonight would go like that but congratz to the Fire and coach Seebohm.
If the Fire knock off Bendigo with this roster, can be no doubt who the number 1 coach in the league is.

Not knocking Shannon for even a second, as he is indeed the best going around, but it's no coincidence that his coaching this season suddenly improved when a WNBA player joined his team.

Yeh Shannon is a fine coach but Petrik should have got COTY this season for over-achieving with the Lynx.

PLAYER UPDATE

Flame #224 Shaneice Swain (knee) will miss Thursday's semi-final showdown with the Bendigo Spirit at Quaycentre.

Did anyone thing the Bendigo-Sydney series would be closer than the Perth-Townsville one?

It wasn't though

Bendigo +26 over the two games, Townsville +35 (and Bendigo were only up six at 3QT when I wrote that).

Lol, there one one close game in the whole semi final series and it was the first one.

(Credit to the Flames for putting up some brave resistance today though. There were obviously good excuses for their loss)

Yeah, you can argue that the game in Perth was close enough the whole way to make the series technically closer despite the wider total points difference, but a week ago I wouldn't have thought there would be any way to even make it a debate. I was expecting the total points difference from the Perth series to be smaller than the margin in either Bendigo game.

Total margins don't always mean much.
Bendigo could have won game 1 by 40 had there been any incentive to do so. And tonight it's hard to know how big of a factor complacency was. Spirit played like they knew they could flip the switch if they needed to, and then they proved themselves correct about that.

I definitely agree the 2-3 series was expected to be closer than it was. That would have been a virtually unanimous expectation.


It will be interesting to see how these series affect the GF teams. Townsville are coming in hot while Bendigo have been less convincing in recent weeks - albeit for understandable reasons.
Having the luxury of sleep-walking through the weeks leading up to the grand finals might not be 100% beneficial.

I will admit, I did not watch either Bendigo game.