Sixers have had a lot to deal with this season, they have made the six, imo it's been reasonably successful, win in Sydney and it’ll be good. When was the last time Sixers played finals.

2018

Interesting note- before Adelaide this season the last time a team went to the postseason 3 or more games below .500 was the 2012-13 Sydney Kings who got fourth with a 12-16 record.

It depends what angle you look at it from.

To some, Adelaide are a constant rabble, selectively competitive, poorly coached, and with a toxic culture who should finish in the top 6 on talent alone, and being eliminated instantly would be a failed season, but good riddance at the same time. Plus, some believe that despite the talent, the roster is flawed.

To others, those exact reasons are why sneaking into the 6th is still an achievement and better than not.

I guess the truth lies somewhere in the middle?

It wasn't smooth for Adelaide this season at all, but at the same time it will never be a smooth and easy transition to "normalcy" in these scenarios either. We've seen it this year, the hot/coldness is that of a team trying to break bad habits, slipping back into them, and everyone getting frustrated at times with the whole process. I don't think there's a magic bullet that fixes that in a team, you can't just throw talent at it, or a big coach, and even with all that it still may fail because of leadership above. I've been in those scenarios myself in the private sector, all the effort and good intentions comes undone because the person above you just comes in and undoes everything.

So you can look at making the play-in as a failure, that's not false at all given the talent on the team, but also you can look at the previous disfunction over the last 5-6 years, see, hey they took some steps forwards this year (and some definite steps back too), but this could be the year where the first stages of the positive change happened and next year could be better because of it. Hard to say what way it'll turn, sports teams in Adelaide have taught me not to have too much hope over the last 10 years or so, so I certainly won't get too excited yet.


And of course that could all be true and GK comes in, fires everyone and just tries to throw more money at the problem and throws us back into the cellar again.

Finishing 6th this season at 13-16 isn't an achievement, it's a Bradbury. Have a look at the situation of the teams below them, either ruined by injury or in NZ's case a bit of self-sabotage.


Having said that, finals is a new season and if they make SFs then they will have lived up to the talent level on their roster. It's doable, but can they play at the level needed defensively to win two elimination games in a row?

I agree that making the play-ins is not a pass for this Sixers team. This roster should be at least a SF team, that would be a bare pass mark.

I could see us beating Sydney in Sydney, we won both games there this season, but in the next play-in either Perth in Perth, where we lost both or SEM in Melb, where again we lost both and overall went 0-4 in Melb this season, will probably be a bridge too far.

However if we did get through to the SF we would be playing the Hawks who we went 3-0 against this season, the path is set up for the Sixers if they get serious.

Joey Wright on the podcast be does with Boti Nagy was asked if he thought Mike Wells was a good coach. Said he runs good sets, but questioned if he's got the pull to tell guys off when they start running their own stuff.

That'll probably be the question for them in the play-in. Run the team game and they can win, guys start freestyling for their own shots and it's one and done.

The door is open for a 36ers Bradbury

Tasmania and Brisbane both very unlucky with injuries and would've been more deserving

As it stands, Adelaide sneaks in with favourable match ups in front of them

Hoping we get a throwdown playoff series. In front of crowds, in Melbourne, for the first time.

The door is open for a 36ers Bradbury

Tasmania and Brisbane both very unlucky with injuries and would've been more deserving

As it stands, Adelaide sneaks in with favourable match ups in front of them

Hoping we get a throwdown playoff series. In front of crowds, in Melbourne, for the first time.

"Joey Wright on the podcast be does with Boti Nagy was asked if he thought Mike Wells was a good coach. Said he runs good sets."

He's a good offensive coach, but in terms of defence, culture and buy-in he's been found well short this year. You can't win titles without those three areas being high level.

Lolz Perth get to play at Challenge stadium

SEM get screwed over, not certain how they recover, no recovery day, straight on the plane to play a finals game.

Might it be the Cats will sell out their game regardless of when it is played subject to no repeat of the ticketing fiasco from last seasons playoffs. But the Kings game needs the extra time for promotion to draw a crowd and tv audience. You would have thought 3rd vs 4th deserve the preferential scheduling for finishing higher in the standings.

Lolz Perth get to play at Challenge stadium

Great

"You would have thought 3rd vs 4th deserve the preferential scheduling for finishing higher in the standings."

It's done this way so the loser of the qualifier gets the longer recovery leading into the play-in game. I think ideally it should be Weds/Fri/Sunday but I don't know venue availabilty, broadcast requests etc.

Didn't there used to be a week off, FIBA window, between the regular season ending and play-ins/playoffs starting?

FIBA window is 17 - 25 February