Round 4: Taipans dig deep to break Melbourne hoodoo

CQUniversity Cairns Taipans (81) def. Melbourne United (77)
Round 4 | John Cain Arena
Next Game: Taipans v Breakers, Sunday 23 October 1:00pm AEST

SUMMARY

The CQUniversity Cairns Taipans showed their fighting qualities and scoring punch to dig themselves out of a couple of holes on Thursday night to beat Melbourne United 81-77 on a career-best showing from Keanu Pinder.

Melbourne led by 14 points midway through the third quarter but Cairns hit back to score the next 22 points to turn that into an eight-point lead just before three quarter-time.

Melbourne again opened a six-point lead midway through the fourth. But once more, Cairns answered with the next nine points to then hold on in a thrilling finish to beat Melbourne for the first time in the last 10 attempts.

The win also improves the Taipans to 4-1 on the season in their best start since the regular season championship winning campaign of 2015.

The Snakes got going early with an 8-0 run thanks to Keanu Pinder but United managed the last five points to go into quarter-time up 19-15.

United then turned that into 12-0 run with the first seven points of the second term before Mirko Djeric steadied things for the Snakes with a three-pointer, and then three free-throws.

Shannon Scott and DJ Hogg then caught fire for the Taipans to help them draw level, but again Melbourne answered and led 43-37 at the half.

United were going at 50 per cent from the field at the half opposed to 36 per cent from Cairns with both teams struggling from deep with Melbourne going at 4/13, and the Taipans 4/14.

Melbourne opened up the second half with a 10-2 run and things were slipping away from Cairns, but they responded to an Adam Forde timeout by scoring the next nine points with Scott producing five of them, and then finding Pinder and Djeric for the others.

Pinder scored again with a nice move to the rack to make it 11 straight points and they weren’t done. Scott knocked down a long ball, then threw up an alley-oop to Pinder and it was a 16-0 run with Cairns up two.

Majok Deng then hit a contested three ball to make it 20 straight Taipans points and Pinder made it 22, and they took a four-point edge into three quarter-time.

It was Rathan-Mayes and Tucker who combined to turn the tide to start the fourth as they scored all of Melbourne's 10 points in a 10-2 run. That gave the home side back the momentum and they turned it into a six-point lead with six minutes on the clock.

However, once more the Snakes refused to lie down. Scott and Pinder inspired another fightback with seven straight points to see them nab the lead with two minutes to play.

They still had that one-point lead with 18.5 seconds left and Melbourne had the ball out of a timeout. Goulding appeared rolling to the basket but Pinder knocked it out of his hands giving the Taipans possession again where Hogg was fouled, and made two with 7.2 seconds left.

United had one more chance and Hogg fouled a three-point shooting Tucker. He needed to make all three but missed the first and third which saw Cairns hold on for the drought breaking win over Melbourne.

STATISTICS

Shannon Scott revelled in being given the keys to the Taipans in the absence of injured captain Tahjere McCall to deliver 19 points, nine assists and six rebounds.

He created a wonderful partnership with Pinder who scored a career-best 26 points for the Taipans to go with eight rebounds, three assists and two steals.

DJ Hogg hit the clutch free-throws and had 13 points for Cairns with Mirko Djeric delivering 11 points with two three-pointers, and Sam Waardenburg eight points, five rebounds and two blocks.

STATEMENTS

Head Coach Adam Forde: 

"In every game we've been down double-digits so we just said that this is no different, we've been here before and let's do it again. They then did it and it was energy. We just came out flat and we didn’t look overly enthusiastic about the first quarter and we talked about how Melbourne were going to come out and really show their home crowd that they were going to win this game. We said we needed to weather that storm in the first quarter and our energy let that stretch out for the entire half. But once we slowly started to ramp it up we got going a little bit, but the problem is I don’t want this to become a consistent thing. I don’t want to be down 10 every game and then decide to come out and play. We know with this team we have to do it defensively and then when the floodgates open up, they will open up and that 22-0 run was our floodgate moment tonight so I'm happy with the boys."

Import forward DJ Hogg:

"So far we are doing pretty well on the road and now we've got one at home on Sunday and we have to put a show on for our fans there, and give them something to come to our games for. We just came out a little flat tonight and our shots weren’t falling, and the ball was sticking a little bit. They were making shots and getting downhill a little too easy, we just weren’t playing the right way. In the second half we picked it up and even though they went on a little run there, we were able to weather the storm and then focus on figuring out how to win the game."