Round 11: Taipans fall at home to Wildcats

CQUniversity Cairns Taipans (83) lost to Perth Wildcats (105)
Round 11 | Cairns Convention Centre
Next Game: Taipans at United, Friday 23 December 6:30pm AEST

SUMMARY

A fourth game in 11 days proved the downfall of the CQUniversity Cairns Taipans with the Snakes' there-game winning run coming to an end with the Perth Wildcats winning 105-83.

The Snakes returned home to Cairns Convention Centre looking for revenge on the Wildcats for earlier in the season and to snap a nine-game losing run against them, but it wasn’t to be.

Perth hadn’t played since last Monday and started strongly through Bryce Cotton and TaShawn Thomas before a Luke Travers three kept them on top. When Brady Manek and Cotton also hit from downtown, the 'Cats were on top 12-6.

Ben Ayre stepped in for Cairns with Shannon Scott injured and made an immediate impact with three three-pointers in a matter of minutes. The only problem was Perth kept scoring up the other end and by quarter-time after a five-point spark from development player Michael Harris, they were up 27-17.

Perth retained control throughout the second quarter as well with Thomas remaining perfect from the field before an and-one from Travers and then three ball in transition from Manek. He backed it up with a tough mid-range fadeaway.

The 'Cats turned that into an 8-0 run to lead by 16. As he's so often done this season, DJ Hogg attempted to will the Snakes back into the contest with nine of his 13 points coming late in the first half.

The Wildcats continued to have the answers, though, and two late bombs from Cotton took him to 13 points for the half, Thomas had 16 and they were up 50-44 including 11 second chance points and 15 from the 11 Cairns turnovers.

Perth opened up the second half with a three from Travers to go up 18 but then the Snakes found their bite. It began with buckets to Tahjere McCall and Keanu Pinder before back-to-back triples to Hogg leading to a John Rillie timeout.

Bul Kuol then drained another from beyond the arc to make it a four-point ball game to complete the stunning 14-0 run to bring the Orange Army to their feet.

The Wildcats had the answers, though, and it was again DP Harris who provided the spark. He knocked down another from downtown, Cotton soon did the same and when Mitch Norton and Harris added three balls heading towards three quarter-time, the margin was 15.

Jonah Antonio at least gave the Taipans some hope going into the fourth with a three to close the third period.

The Wildcats were back up 17 early in the fourth when Manek found Travers for another three-pointer before the lead got out to as much as 23 with Perth winning by 22.

STATISTICS

The Wildcats have now won 10 straight against Cairns with the Taipans not able to beat the Wildcats still since Game 2 of the semi-final series of 2020 led by Scott Machado, DJ Newbill and Cam Oliver under current 'Cats assistant Mike Kelly.

It was a tough loss for Cairns but it was their third game in seven days. DJ Hogg ended up top-scoring with 24 points, eight rebounds and three assists while hitting 4/11 from deep.

Tahjere McCall added 18 points, 10 rebounds and four assists while Bul Kuol contributed 11 points and three assists, Jonah Antonio 10 points, and Ben Ayre 10 points with three first quarter bombs.

STATEMENTS

Head Coach Adam Forde: 

"It was pretty disappointing in the sense of our defence again in the first quarter. There were some similar errors from what we had in Tassie. There was a lot of things and I look at the first quarter where Thomas really came out aggressive, and probably put Keanu on the back foot. You add in five offensive rebounds, and I'm not trying to put Keanu on the spot, but a lot of them were as a result of him getting caught napping. They were converting on everything and I think they had 11 second chance points, and we had some costly turnovers and sloppy execution on the defensive end. Suddenly we're in the changeroom at half-time and they've got 55 on us. That was pretty much the gist of it, not all five guys being in sync especially on defence."

Taipans Guard Shannon Scott:

"Definitely you get frustrated at times. You want to try to stay aggressive on the defensive end but when you're getting fouls called as a human being you think about it a little bit. A few of us got three or four fouls and had to try not being as aggressive, but we still have to play our same game. We have to do a better job of that."