Adelaide will be better on the road. Could be an upset here.

Adelaide will be better on the road.

If we have modelled out lineup and plays on the Golden State Warriors
fare enough, its a solid plan if you have the shooters,
not sure how anyone can think that they are anyone else really...
but
in terms of data analytics and coaching approach,
I reckon the Kings are modelled on the Milwaukie Bucks
and good luck to them, its a great game plan if you have the horses.

Kai Sotto will shit all over the KANGz and put that man bun bum Xavier Cooks on a poster.

I hope Coach CJ actually gives King Kai some fucking minutes tonight.

If you are kings supporter you will be looking forward to Kia getting minutes. Just a thought.

Kings comfortably.

Kings deserve to be heavy favourites, but rooting for a Sixers upset because Paul Smith is a knob jockey.

Adelaide should be able to give Sydney a real challenge or have people gone off Adelaide already? I certainly don't feel as confident after seeing similar patterns to last season in the first two weeks, but Adelaide should be up there with Sydney.

Whichever teams 3s fall will win the game.
Its as simple as that.
Thats all basketball has become.

Hopefully its a good game, still think Sydney will come away with it though.

Caint wait. Expecting a good one. Tooo close to call.
Even if Randall gets thirty. Could be one point in it, either way, in overtime.

Kinda feel like he'll have a crap game tbh and chuck up too much that goes clunk

36ers haven't been good. I’d be surprised if they get within 10.

Grand final preview

Ooft that reffing standard

Refs keeping the kings in it

Very nice half from Sixers, can they keep it going. Kings defensively been average. Cooks and Vasiljevic minus 12. Franks playing like he did last season. Glover been good on defence for kids. Cleveland and Randal also very good and Sixers bench holding there own.

This thread went silent after half time lol

Did the Kings train the refs in the off-season?

Geezzzzzz

Cracking game, as they say don't go anywhere.

Why is Sydney bench on the left? isn't home team ment to be on the right?

Nbl is rigged. Adelaide getting hosed by the referring tonight

Wagstaff gets 2 game ban for incidentally hitting someone in the head.

Kings collect 36ers multiple times and it's all g?

Wtf?

Eat it Smith

Justice

Onya Sixers

Good quality game. Can't ask for 3 better looks than what we missed down the stretch there.

Congratulations to Sixers, certainly deserved the there win. Mccaron was so good for Sixers at both ends. Kings arrogance got put in place, coach CJ certainly looks in control.

Johnson was very god as well.

Maybe the jet lag was the issue after all!

Nice.

As the old saying goes "Anyone but Sydney."

NBL feels like a very dynamic league

Some of the MVP candidates (if it was called today)

Walton Jr
Randall II
Pinder
XRM

Obviously you've got some usual suspects from last year Cotton and Cooks

But the first 4 are in the frame. 2 of those guys are new to the league. 2 were playing but nowhere near the impact they're having right now

This game tonight had 7 guys who feel like a threat to go off for 25

Randall, Franks, DJ, Cleveland

Cooks, Walton Jr, DJ

And plenty of complimentary pieces on both sides. Inc Simon- 2 time reigning DPOY (Aus and Germany), Mr everywhere McCarron etc

These are the two most talented teams. Good chance of meeting in the GF if they stay healthy, buy into their roles and their coaches are competent (ie not out of their depth. Which we already know Buford isn't)

Lol how's all the Kings fans saying ADL were no chance. Nice boys.

Smith will go back into his hole for a few weeks hopefully

Sydney certainly had some good looks late

Kings did screw the pooch at the end, but amateur hour reffing helped the kings be competitive at the end

Kings certainly played with less poise in the last 2 mins.

To be fair Sixers dodged a couple of bullets when the Kings (Walton and DJ) missed two open threes.

Philipinos sure go quiet when the Sixers win with little Kai time.

Isn't it great? A literal win-win

DJ. Rollin back the tine machine....all systems are go. He in for massive year.. focus on others but DJ is potent... been doing it solo now got some others to make defensively matching up near impossible
.. fun year love it soxers. Believers

Thought Cooks and Vasilavic were average, certainly didn't beat their opponents tonight. To much love for Noi in the commentary team as well, he ain’t that good.

Looking forward to the return match, should be a beauty, kings pride being wounded.

Adelaide's use of the coaches challenge certainly made it harder for themselves down the stretch, I'll say that.

Craig Randall has all sorts of potential but he lacks discipline and his decision making is poor. He could be moulded into an NBA player with Adelaide if he actually follows instruction and takes criticism.

Agreed with Randall needing to be refined a touch

But at the same time he is averaging Cotton-esque numbers at better shooting percentages at this point and the team is 2-1, so hard to complain too much.

Also, havent really seen him do anything Curry, Harden, Lillard types dont do in the NBA, not a fan of garbage shots either but with guys like this as the role models its the way the game seems to be trending, i guess as long as he can make them at a decent overall clip we just need to learn to live with it.

I think Aussie NBL fans will always be a bit more discerning than Americans and NBA fans in general. The NBA is a very iso, ego driven league so comparing Randall in the NBL to a Lillard in the NBA isn't a like for like comparison. Chances are if Randall were to go to the NBA he wouldn't be 'that guy' on the team and there would be another Lillard or Durant throwing up whatever. Then he'd have to learn to play a more conservative role. But beyond just jacking up shots he's also made a lot of low IQ plays.

His opportunity is as a sparkplug with the second unit in the NBA, make an impact in short minutes, if he's hot they ride him a bit longer, if not take him out.

Yeah kings combination of DJV and cooks not playing fantastic, 21% or whatever from 3 plus those clutch wide-open misses are more to do with the Kings than the 36ers.

If you're 4-2 and you’re lose by a couple of points under all those factors, you’d feel like you’re in a great place in such an even NBL where runs of wins is tough. You know next game those shots will statistically go in at a higher rate, so just keep playing like that and they’ll win far more games than they will lose.

For 36ers whilst Randall is playing out of his mind and the team kind of pulling it out of their arse a little bit, they’ll want to focus on:
1) what happens when those shots don’t fall - what can they do to find other shots
2) limit turnovers
3) fix their defensive woes

For #1 it starts with more ball movement, they still get stagnant, and really use DJ, get him the ball. He knows what a timely basket is and how to get it. Get Franks into form, make some moves to isolate him low and get him opportunities to get back into form rather than chucking threes up with a hand in his face from deep.

For #2, part of it is just chemistry, part of it will be the natural effect of a fast paced transition game style which is still the style 36ers should take, the other part is avoiding the lazy passes. Randall needs to adjust to the NBL and just understand you will have tight defensive and so will the others, so you have to make a conscious effort to not be lazy with your passes. That’s 1-2 less turnovers.

For #3, it’s awkward. 36ers adjusted by giving space to the guards to try and clog up the basket, so the Kings just ran at them. Guys like Walton Jr and Cooks don’t have an issue doing that. Realistically 36ers need to not give that space and use their elite guard defenders in MM, Dech and Cleveland to stop their dribble and prevent them making a run at you.

That means finding another way. Do they go real small and have Franks, Cleveland, Dech, MM, Randall? Or will they get caned on the rebounds?

They need to work hard to get someone like Galloway into the rotation to exercise some athleticism on D.

The talent is clearly there for the 36ers and there’s in theory no team and no place they can’t win.

Definitely don’t have the trust yet to watch a game and think "don’t worry, we got this", because they don’t have the polish and class of a Wildcats, Kings etc yet.

And yet all the Kai fan boys want the entire coaching staff and imports sacked after the win , my god there salty mofos

I know the Sixers were saying there was going to be opportunities for more minutes for Sotto for this season but the reality is he only got the minutes he did last season because the team was crap.

This season the Sixers have bought up A grade talent and should be a championship contender so of course Sotto's minutes have gone down. If he played on a less talented team he might get comparable minutes to other back up centres but it's not like he's a starting quality player at NBL level.

Sotto's a second string centre at best in the NBL it's just because he's now playing on a very good team that he's getting third-string centre minutes, Acuoth that actual third-stringer isn't really playing at all.

Adelaide should be favorites to win it all given they have the most talented roster in the NBL

Updated odds have the Sixers as joint favourites with the Kings now.

With the Lakers unable to hit anything outside the foul line (questionable if they can hit foul shots), the. Surely end of the season as a pick up 3 only player for the Lakers at basement price could be on the cards.

"Adelaide should be favorites to win it all given they have the most talented roster in the NBL."

Their lack of bigs is a major weak point, which shows up at both ends when their shots aren't dropping.

I wonder what capacity they have to replace Bairstow with Acouth....

I'm not saying Bairstow is a defensive minded player, but he’s just "good enough" to avoid it being a fatal weak point and when he’s on the play he plays offensively with the cleanup role last year, you wouldn’t be feeling the pinch of “crap why is he on” on that end of things either.