Hawks bitten by sharp shooting Taipans

The Result

Illawarra Hawks 95 – Cairns Taipans 101

The Story

What looked like being a routine victory for the Hawks in the NBL Cup opener turned sour in the space of a quarter this afternoon - a red-hot shooting spree from the Cairns Taipans coupled with some poor defensive lapses instead ensuring the Hawks suffered their third loss in their last four games.

The Hawks again started the game well - Justinian Jessup draining two long bombs in the opening stanza as the Taipans struggled to contain the Golden State Warriors draftee.

Big man Sam Froling was already working his way towards a double double by quarter time with 4 points and five boards, but it was the Taipans who led 19-18 at the first break.

A second quarter swing saw the Hawks start to edge away - a pair of dominant defensive plays from Justin Simon and former-Boomer Cam Bairstow summing up the Hawks commitment on the less-attractive end of the court - and helping the Hawks take a slender five-point lead into the main break.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Protect the house ? <a href="https://twitter.com/simon_Says_so?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@simon_Says_so</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/cambairstow41?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@cambairstow41</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/IllawarraProud?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#IllawarraProud</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/FlyAsOne?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#FlyAsOne</a> <a href="https://t.co/nWaqZWlYIb">pic.twitter.com/nWaqZWlYIb</a></p>&mdash; Illawarra Hawks Basketball (@illawarrahawks) <a href="https://twitter.com/illawarrahawks/status/1362991167567130624?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 20, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

As was the case last week against the Kings though - a frustrating third term awaited the Wollongong-based club, with Taipans main man Cam Machado getting well and truly off the leash and trimming the Hawks lead to three with 10 minutes to play.

Hawks coach Brian Goorjian left searching for answers to quell the diminutive guard's hot hand.

"I thought the end of the third quarter really was depressing...how we defended Machado is th whole game. When I went to the bench and brought in a defender on him he hit three threes late in the third quarter so in the fourth quarter I had to go to rotation and when we started rotating all hell broke loose. They've got a lot of great shooters and it's something we wanted to stay away from. Late in the third quarter we had to change our gameplan and our new gameplan was a bad one," Goorjian said.

A series of misses followed by some poor fouls allowed Cairns to push to the front, where they stayed until the fulltime buzzer - with Goorjian not holding back post-match about his side's 'depressing' performance.

"When we’ve been good we've got out on transition off our defence and the two wins we had up there [in Cairns] we really defended and got a lot of easy buckets...and tonight giving up over 100 points in a forty minute game is just disappointing...if we don't defend we're not going anywhere," Goorjian said.

Goorjian also lashing his bench in the post-match presser, saying too much pressure was placed on the starting lineup in today's loss.

"The second aspect of our team's success so far has been the bench and we've got great contribution. And I thought tonight, everytime I went to it, we went backwards….always putting pressure on the first group," Goorjian said.

Goorjian also addressing the shooting woes of Deng Adel as the former-Cleveland Cavalier works his way back to form after a preseason injury.

"He's putting a lot of pressure on himself and now they're really laying off him. One of the things we've talked about is getting involved in the game on the glass, get to the foul line, get a steal. The depressing part from him at halftime was the fact he had one rebound. Regardless of if he's hitting his shot or missing his shot, he can really help us on the defensive end of the floor and the glass. I think he'll loosen up from the perimeter if he gets some easy stuff but tonight that didn't happen," Goorjian said.

The Stats

Sam Froling again put his name up in lights, 'Frols' dropping 12 points to go with 12 rebounds as he continues to make his case for 'Most Improved Player 'in the league. The 12 boards a career-high for the Queensland-born Froling.

Deng Deng exploded off the bench for a career-high 17 points to go with 5 rebounds. Deng has been threatening to have a bigger impact on games this season and he took advantage of close friend Adel's shooting struggles to log more minutes.

Justinian Jessup barely missed on his way to 17 points, with the Next Star connecting on 5/6 attempts from the land of plenty.

Cam Bairstow continued his resurgence after injury derailed the start of the season. 'The Bear' finishing with a double double (13 points and 10 rebounds) to go with two steals.

And Tyler Harvey has his usual self in this one - walking away with 24 points, 5 rebounds and 4 dimes. It was the third time in as many games Harvey has scored 20 or more against the Taipans.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Heat check <a href="https://twitter.com/YoungTRaaw?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@YoungTRaaw</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/IllawarraProud?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#IllawarraProud</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/FlyAsOne?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#FlyAsOne</a> <a href="https://t.co/zroDJgbSNI">pic.twitter.com/zroDJgbSNI</a></p>&mdash; Illawarra Hawks Basketball (@illawarrahawks) <a href="https://twitter.com/illawarrahawks/status/1362994295297384448?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 20, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

The Casualty Ward

Nothing to report here but Goorjian did speak after the game about skipper AJ Ogilvy's limited role against the Snakes.

"Nothing wrong with AJ. I elected to go with small lineup. If you watch the NBA or Euro League you gotta have two lineups, big and small. Now that we've got healthy I'm gonna play some small ball with Justinian and Justin in that four spot to run and then come back to the bigs. I just tried to open up the game with Cam [Bairstow] rotating in and Sam [Froling] is playing really good so he just got pushed out of the rotation tonight. There's no health issue or problem with him at all," Goorjian said.

The Road Ahead

Round 6 NBL Cup – Monday 22 February at 5pm v NZ Breakers @ John Cain Arena, Melbourne

In good news for the Hawks, a matchup with the NZ Breakers is only two sleeps away, meaning they won't have to wait long to right some wrongs.

The Breakers have had a tough time of it so far this season, winning only the one game and sitting at the foot of the NBL ladder.

They are a better side than the standings say though - their inability to play at home and spending the last two months living out of a suitcase sure to be taking its toll.

The Breakers - much like the Taipans today - will come into this fixure rested, having not played since going down by 10 points to the Sydney Kings on February 12.