Round 15: Taipans v Hawks

CQUNIVERSITY CAIRNS TAIPANS V ILLAWARRA HAWKS
TICKETS AVAILABLE ONLINE NOW
(Cairns Convention Centre, 6:30pm)
Watch live on ESPN via Kayo Sports or Foxtel

LAST MEETING

These two teams met two rounds ago, and Ben Ayre had eight points in less than 90 seconds to put a stop to a sluggish start. His impact of the bench spurred a 28-2 run, but the Hawks had homecourt advantage and managed to regain the lead in the third. Cairns ended up having enough answers with the game on the line with their first win in the 'Gong in over six years.

LINE-UP

Keanu Pinder has not suited up since Christmas and will miss another two games this round, after not passing his fitness test yesterday.

Michael Frazier II and Peyton Siva are out for the Hawks and will be for the remainder of the season.

LOOK FOR

Tahjere McCall – back in black. The Taipans star has made no secret that the blackout uniforms, worn to raise funds and awareness for charity IFYS Foster Care is his favourite strip and it shows. Last blackout match he scored 42 points – becoming the first NBL player to score 40+ points and 10+ assists in the 40-minute area.

LATEST WORDS

“The challenge this weekend, is we have a 40-hour turnaround from playing Illawarra at home, to playing the Breakers in New Zealand. That’s going to pose separate challenges. Schedule-wise, it is what it is, but to host Illawarra on Friday night and then to try get the boys to do the best possible recovery they can that night – which is always a tricky one, post-game – we then take a connecting flight and arrive in Auckland about 1:00 in the morning. We’re at the casino, which is good, they’ve got thick curtains so the boys will sleep in right until tip-off. And, hopefully get the job done,” – Head Coach Adam Forde

“Pretty sure we are feeling how everybody else is feeling at this time of the year. It’s been a long season, there’s a lot of banged up bodies. But this is the time, where everybody is feeling the same. So, we’re excited to get to this last stretch of games and finish how I know we can finish,” – Tahjere McCall