36ers blew them out last time, should be a tighter contest tonight. I think the 36ers will be too much, been better the last few games and should be too strong for the Hawks at home. Adelaide by 8.

Game preview on my blog

http://www.36reasons.net/2012/03/hawks-home-take-two.html

Last time, this game was a total blowout but I expect the Hawks to do well.
Size wise, we have advantage with Simpson, Helliwell and DJ all being far taller than most of the Hawks so should be able to get inside and do some damage.

That said, rebounding will be pivotal towards the result. Dont rebound and the Hawks give themselves a chance. Gotta control the boards.

Game tempo will also be a major factor in this also.

Sixers by 5 in O/T

Lasr time , our bigs were pretty good , their coach said. Helliwell only got about 6 and 6 ...............

Career best!!

Vanderjagt lover.

Looking for another great game by Barlett. Sixers should win, but I always hope the Big O has a great game in a losing team.

I'd like to change my margin then. Adelaide by 15.

Catron was the Hawks best last time they played here IIRC.

Sixers by 10+ tonight with the usual suspects, DJ, Simpson & Warren to score 15+ and possibly Darren Ng as well.

What the hell was that 1/4 time presentation, was I the only one that couldn't understand want the hell she was saying.

Only 3,597 showed for the last 36ers vs Hawks game at the Adelaide Arena on 4 December, a Friday night game. With the Clipsal 500 & the Fringe going on in Adelaide I wonder what the attendance will be tonight?

There goes the 100point game, & it's only half time

If the 36ers want to avoid taking the worse defensive record from the Kings they're going to have to restrict Wollongong to 66 points or less.

Took the 5 line for win and looked fine with a couple of minutes to go then it fell apart. What's the deal with Simpson? Why is he in the dog house or was he injured.

We won this purely because Wollongong are such a bad team..I have no idea when our substitutions return to Clarks old crappy methods..Why did we not have a centre on court for 5 minutes? Why does Creek get benched for every mistake..but Weigh can suck the entire game and still get more minutes. Herbert only saw court time in the last quarter??
Took my dad along tonight..hes not a basketball fan his only other game he has seen was a few weeks ago..When we walked out he pointed out how structured Wollongong looked while the Adelaide players looked lost. Horrible and lucky to win, tonight against any other team we would have lost big time.

I also wonder when the sivers are going to get some decent floor wipers or some decent bloody mops..to many delays today really did not help the crowd get into the game at any stage.

Overall the most boring game I have watched where we won lol

Maybe Clarke did not want to risk having Simpson's foul shooting on the floor down the stretch, but i would have thought the positives would have outweighed the negatives.

Also cannot understand why Herbert and Helliwell did not get just a few more minutes
given the quality of what they did on the floor compared to some others,
but hey I am not coaching for my future.

Pretty horrible game all round really, but winning real ugly is better than loosing.

Yeah, those floor wipers really played into Woolongong's hands,
the Hawks clearly wanted a slower more structured and controlled tempo and whenever they wanted to put the breaks on the game, one of them just rolled onto the floor knowing that it was going to waste a minute or so before the game could be resumed.

Back at the start of the season, the floor wipers had proper large circular wipers, but apparently now small white towels administered by the foot are the ridiculously preferred option. Even the small broom things they had were not used much.

Like mentioned above when Dj went out with cramp/strain we ran a small lineup for ages. Why we just burn talent and 2nd chance points with Simpson on the pine is a mystery to me.

Just glad we got the W. Simpson was off tonight. Took 2 bad jumpers ( he shouldn't be shooting anything that's not directly under the basket) and was a liability from the line. marty seems to punish him whenever he misses freebies. Imagine if Orlando did that everytime Howard missed 2. Clarke's rotations were solid in the first half...not so much in the 2nd. No Helliwell or Simpson down the strecth didn't make sense, Weigh got burned several times having to play some centre.

Full review up on my 36ers blog

http://www.36reasons.net/2012/03/what-did-you-expect-adelaide-v.html

"Back at the start of the season, the floor wipers had proper large circular wipers, but apparently now small white towels administered by the foot are the ridiculously preferred option. Even the small broom things they had were not used much. "

The kids couldnt push the big ones..deffinetly need something better than what they are using though, surely cleaning companies have better than Woolworths brought mops!!

I think if you watch the replay Simpson didnt want to take either of those shots but had to when noone presented themselves for a pass..he hesitated on the second one which screwed any chance he had. The reality is we know he sucks from the freethrow line so learn to deal with it, but he can still score 20 points when he is used properly. Tonight was one of his worse nights in not hitting his first shot, but he was being fouled hard by Wollongong to make sure he wasnt. Clark should have put Helliwell on the court with Simpson since it would have really stretched the gongs defence and give Simpson some space to work on one side. Tonight he was 4-8 at the line in the first 5 minutes..putting 4 fouls on the other team so they were in foul trouble for most of the quarter.

This has been the constant problem with Clark..none of the players are used correctly.

He gave 'Stevie' a run at Centre and Davidson did pretty well then , of course.

Was an ugly game, but I really have no idea what all the Marty knockers are on about. We were 10 up twice with two minutes to go, looking comfortable for the win. The we turn it over on full court pressure three times in a row, because we lack safe guards with composure who can look after the ball. Nothing to do with whether Simpson was or was not on court. And we still won. We won ugly, but that is where we are at as a team. Get used to it. Overall our play has improved over the season.

The term 'wiped the floor with them' takes on a new meaning when it comes to the sixers. Bloody embarrassing to see the players have to do their own floor wiping again.

XY - I only saw the last quarter but wondered why Simpson and Helliwell were off the whole quarter. It looked to me that the 6ers probably would have been up by a lot more than 10 if they'd had someone to pass to close to the basket or to rebound in the first 6 minutes of the last. The 6 ers last quarter offence largely was dribbling and passing around the 3 point line and ending up with a prayer from 16 to 20 feet. At the time, I assumed there were foul problems or something else had been going on in the first 3 quarters was behind it.

From what I saw, we should not have ended up in the situation that arose in those last 4 minutes, and staying with the small line up the whole quarter wasa big reason for it.

Not the prettiest game to see,Sixers got over the line,amazing we had all the guards on court and Weigh was Centre,very rare seeing Simpson,Johnson,helliwell on the bench.Catron not playing for the hawks which was good.Simpson was off tonight everyone usually have an off night.Players seem to wipe the floors most of the time last night,Yes we had big wipes but the usual BasketballSA tactic they have bought replacement wipes from Cheap as Chips.We have NZ next week and will need a better performance from the whole team.

The other factor drawing the crowd away is District have Div 1 nights on Fridays.My assumption, there is a lot of passionate people in all of these teams and more likely to be supporters.I know of 5 families who are focusing on their kids games from 2 x Div 1 teams.
With the floor mopping isnt there two mature people who know how to wipe a floor speedily somewhere?Why kids? Kids have short attention spans .Kids dont know what a mop is for

I actually thought that Clarke's decision to leave Simpson off in the last quarter was correct, and the small lineup he went with was almost an inspired move. DJ had an off night, but I always felt we were in control. It was an ugly game though, and about the only highlight was Herbert's steal and dunk.

No Anonymous #352730 Im not blaming BASA for crowd numbers.I would have said BASA in my comment.Its one other small factor .

Funny thing is coach reckons the team is still developing. This means a rise by one position each year will mean 36ers will be number 1 in 8 years, not bad eh

You need to leave Simpson on the bench when its foul time. Otherwise they score 2 or 3 each possession and we get stuck with Simpson on the line.

I'm going to be extremely un PC here. Why do we give the only usable floor wiping device to the down syndrome girl? She doesn't know how to use it and it holds up the game EVERY SINGLE WEEK.
Get new people. People who know what they are doing (maybe some training?) and give them a tool to use that they can actually perform their job with. A towl being rubbed into the floor by foot doesn't work. A handicapped girl with a broom doesn't work. I'm sorry to have to put it this way, I have no issues with handicapped people at all, but don't make them do something they aren't capable of doing. If It's holding up the came, find something that won't.

Ok got that off my chest.

Didn't think we were in any doubt that we'd win that. And we really shouldn't lose to Wollongong.
We went inside to the bigs on our first 6 possessions or so, they weren't finishing, but it was clearly working. They were fouling, we were getting free points (well should have been).
Then at one point Marty decided that we'd go tiny. Weigh isn't a Centre, I never want to see him even as a power forward when we have 3 quality bigs. (Helliwell knows his role and plays it well).
Herbert didn't see any court time for the first half at least. Interesting move, but with Bartlett, Ng and Creek playing well he isn't needed much.
Simpson definitely has been working on his free throws. Still not at an acceptable level, but you can see he's putting in the effort.
DJ was off last night. Really wasn't taking intelligent shots.
Ng hit some tough shots.
Warren was more aggressive than I'm used to seeing which was good to see. Seems to fit well with Bartlett.
Wollongong really were an ugly team to watch last night.
Mr 1 possession offense was up to his usual tricks. Put it together in the last, but watching it back last night, in a set up offense I reckon he didn't hit double figures for passes.
Saville couldn't hit the side of a barn.
Davidson was probably the best I've seen him all year. But that isn't saying a lot. Played well though.
Gruber is horrible. How he got a gig as an import is beyond me. Then to spend multiple years as an import is even more baffling.
Forman wasn't hitting shots and that's basically all he does.

Should have won by 15+ really, but that's where we are at as a team at the moment. On the plus side, we won. And that makes consecutive wins. First time since January last year? 3 out of 4 and a reasonable showing against Perth, so we aren't doing too bad at the moment.

Id argue this team has regressed not made improvements this season. Not impressed with how long this down period, which every sports team and its fans faces time to time, is lasting with minimal improvement.

"The other factor drawing the crowd away is District have Div 1 nights on Fridays"

Game was Saturday night mate..sooo not really a factor :)

DJ was subbed out at 7:57 to go in the last. We had a five point lead. We played small ball until 4:07 to go when DJ checked back in. We still had a five point lead. But we get the usual refrain that that is bad coaching.

DJ was shooting at 4/17 for the game, which is extremely inefficient. Simpson at 2/6 and 5/10 from the line and was facing the hack-a-Shak strategy. But 4 minutes of small ball where we stayed on level pegging with the other team is cause for another call to sack the coach.

I am happy to hear some logical considered reasoning as to why a coaching change is necessary. But it seems some people have some serious agendas that they need to get over. It is easy to find fault if that is all you are ever looking for.

Coaches lose games and players win them as the saying goes

I believe this squad is trending up

DJ was going better than Weigh . Simpson was going better than Weigh.
Weigh had 2points , same as Helliwell.
Weigh had no hope guarding Davidson.
Weigh-Clarke nepotism is lessening my emotional relationship with this club.

XY, it was a low percentage strategy by a coach that will lead the Sixers to their worst season record in both years.

What other team is having their 6'7 small forward playing center? Perhaps go with that team against NZ next week?

I am glad we did well offensively during this period pushing the lead up to 10 before they closed it back to 5. However this low percentage strategy could have cost us the game.

DJ was shooting bad but was getting to the line. Simpsons defence could have helped in the last quarter.

Any win is good but we should have won that by double figures.

Can something be done to improve PA annoucements at the dome.I was curious in the quarter time presentationbut didnt hear a word and i was in my listening trying to listen. Happens all the time any presentation is made - hear not a word

I thout Weigh played a pretty good game other than a couple of unnecessary turnovers that are, unfortunately, a bit of a trademark. Needs to be a bit more active in offense, but was one of our better players.

KingJames, are you seriously saying that the coach was exercising poor judgment in putting on a risky combination of players and was lucky that it worked? Others might say that it was an inspired strategy from a coach amazingly in tune with game which we unfortunately stuck with for about a minute too long. You know, if you look hard enough, you might even find something positive to say. If Phil S had done the same thing we would have called him a genius (which we did, for a while).

Two months ago, we would have found a way to lose that game. It might just be me, but I am finding all of the constant bagging out of the coach win lose or draw a little dull.

I would be curious to hear what King james makes of Trevor Gleeson and Gordie McLeod's coaching.
Their teams are losing and so therefore it is the coaches fault right?

DJ was going better than Weigh . Simpson was going better than Weigh.
Weigh had 2points , same as Helliwell.

An earler point in the game.
Weigh had 2points for 3 quarters. Aw , gotta three in late in the third. Those numbers are very good.
Finished the game pretty good. But Weigh's (performance) at Centre was downright terrible.

According to TV news , last month , Maher Davis Stirling were gonna give Clarke mentoring.
But it's only Stirling and Maher Davis (and Woodville footy coach spoke to players).
We saw Chris get it to Ng early , to get him going,
a little less of Weigh. A little bitta improvement , in a month.

"I would be curious to hear what King james makes of Trevor Gleeson and Gordie McLeod's coaching. "

Yes and No...Wollongong has a limited budget and nowhere near the talent of Adelaide. Saville is out of form this year and it will probaly be his last because of it. Saying this..Davidson their highest scoring player didnt play the last couple of minutes of the game, having him on could have easily won the game for them since the only person we have to Defend him would be Simpson and Helliwell and Clark clearly had no intention of playing them.

Would you like to be Gleeson this season?? Alot of the Tigers problems come back to Seamus. I am more interested in Gleeson as a coach next year than I am this year. They went for Mills and never truly replaced him, sacked Corletto, sacked Ubaka and dont have a proper line up because of it.

The difference to me is Clark has a young talented line up even with the injuries we have had. The issue Clark has is the same as Neil Craig, hes not a game coach..never going to be in my opinion. He doesnt play players to their strenghts and doesnt recognise when they should and shouldnt be on the court. He is unable to change the team to suit the situation.

We didnt win saturday because of Clarks Coaching..we won because Wollongon are seriously rubbish this season.
I also have no Doubt either Mcloed or Gleeson would have done better this season than Clark has..easily infact

XY, are you saying a 6'7 small forward as your center is a good strategy? The team was massively disadvantaged in defence and we were lucky we hit a few tough shots. Herbert hit a 3 over the out stretched hand of Saville. Creek hit a shot over Davidson. I can't remember Weighs completely but thought it was a tough shot in the situation he was in. Herbert got a steal and dunk. I can't remember if anyone else scored. If we try that strategy against NZ they will destroy us. I was happy that the strategy killed 3 minutes without us losing any points and we were able to win the game.

If Smyth (just after the championships), Goorgian or any other top coach did it I would think it is a crazy move but would have confidence since they have been successful. Now when a coach that is going to lead us to two seasons of the worst season record goes for such a low percentage strategy then that concerns me. Also those other coaches wouldn't do something like that for a reason because it is a low percentage strategy.

"Two months ago, we would have found a way to lose that game." So you feel like it was a convincing win? Those turnovers didn't worry you at all? I thought we struggled to close the game out and if we were playing a better opponent then we more then likely would have lost.

I will say another risky strategy was the full court press that was put into place a few minutes out from half time with the Sixers up by 7. Hawks got an easy layup and then an easy open 3 to bring the margin back to 2 at half with the Sixers losing momentum. Sure it is easy for me to look at that from hindsight but I don't understand why that risk was required. We had control of the game and the momentum we just needed to close out the half.

XY, I know you want me to say something positive about the coach so I will say that I was happy that he didn't play Herbert until the second half. Herbert has been given enough chances this season and Ng has been playing well lately so he deserves the minutes. When Herbert did come on he did play well to his credit and got some confidence from the steal and dunk. I will also say that I have been happy that Weighs minutes have come down finally

BFJ, McLeods coaching use to be good but I think he has lost it now. I have no idea why he doesn't use Davidson more and as Skud said he should have been out there to finish the game. Gleeson use to be good in Townsville but I don't think he has the respect of the players at the Tigers and put all his Eggs in one basket with Pat Mills with no back up plan if he left. It is interesting to see that he played walker for 30 minutes last game though.