Isaac
Years ago
Funny Sixers break NZ, 104-78
The Adelaide 36ERS tonight destroyed the NZ Breakers final quarter comeback attempt, running rampant in the final two minutes to win 104-78.
The 26 point victory was dominated by Willie Farley's 26 point individual contribution, and a quality 23 points from Brett Maher. Forward Dusty Rychart added 20 points of his own and provided what was to be an ultimately winning beginning for the home team.
Also strong was Paul Rees, picking up 14 points including a three-point shot that had the Adelaide crowd in full voice.
The Sixers started strongly on the back of Rychart's 10 first quarter points and the period also featured Rees holding out Breaker Ben Pepper. It was the Breakers leading for most of the period, however, before they came back to edge out 24-23. Maher had 9 points for the quarter.
The second started with Oscar Forman picking up three rebounds in quick succession and Rychart continuing his inside scoring. A Maher steal from Breaker co-captain Pero Cameron and resulting score saw the NZ squad take a time-out to regroup. A Maher 3 and then a Farley 3 and dunk on the next play gave the Sixers a decent lead before Cameron nailing a 3 from the corner and Ben Thompson scoring another 3 for the Breakers made it 44-40.
From there, an 8-2 run courtesy of Maher and Farley brought Adelaide to a 54-44 half-time scoreline. At the long break, Maher led all scorers with 17. Rychart had 16, Farley 9 and Rees had 7 early points.
Mike Chappell had 13 and Cameron was backing him up with 8.
Over the first 24 minutes, the Sixers had commited only 3 turnovers to the Breakers' 10. They were scoring more efficiently (44%-38% FG, 38%-29% 3P), but were narrowly beaten on the boards (27-28).
The second half saw the Sixers go scoreless for more than 4 minutes as the NZ squad pulled to be 3 points down. That is, until Farley got on the break for two points and followed that up with a steal and another 2; 15 points to his name and a 60-57 scoreline. Pepper, at this stage, picked up his fifth foul.
A Forman 3 and then Maher grabbing a tough 2-point fadeaway basket as the shot clock dropped to 1 second had the score at 66-58. Jacob Holmes scored his first field goal of the game in the final minute and the Sixers were 70-63 to close out the period. Maher 21, Rychart 17, Farley 15. Chappell was leading the Breakers with 15.
Enter the final 12 minutes and the Breakers would not give up. Cameron had 2 and Chappell made a huge baseline dunk to bring the Breakers within a single shot of drawing level.
Holmes had his trademark fadeaway on track for 2 and Farley continued his onslaught with a 3 pointer. A big dunk to Forman courtesy of a Rees assist and then Farley with consecutive scores took it back to 10 points. From there, the Sixers were on fire -- Rees, Holmes, Farley all scoring. Then came Rees' 3 and another from Darren Ng. It would be fair to say that those who'd came along to see the game were pumped by this point.
104-78 at the last buzzer, and the Sixers move to 4-1 and equal holding on the top of the Philips Championship ladder.
Sixers: Farley 26, Maher 23, Rychart 20, Rees 14, Holmes 10, Forman 5, Ng 3, Cooper 2, Williams 1.
Breakers: Cameron, Chappell, Olson 17, Redhage 11.
On the boards: Rychart, Holmes 8, Forman 6, Rees, Farley 5.
Assists: Maher 6.
First: 24-23
Second: 30-21
Third: 16-19
Fourth: 34-15
FG: 45%-32%
3P: 42%-21%
FT: 69%-76%
Boards: 41-54
Fouls: 17-25
Assists: 20-12
Blocks: 5-3
Steals: 9-1
Turnovers: 6-19
Boxscore »
