Snake Eyes – Taipans v Wildcats

Monday night will be the only time that the Perth Wildcats come to the Pop-Up Arena this NBL season and what better opportunity for the Cairns Taipans to show their fighting spirit in front of the Orange Army.

Last time the Taipans hosted the Wildcats in Cairns they won Game 2 of the semi-final series last year and while plenty has changed since, the Snakes have a chance to show their heart and put a dagger into the 'Cats top spot aspirations this Monday night.

Monday will just be the second last home game at the Pop-Up Arena of this season for the Taipans with the team determined to get back in front of the Orange Army and reward them for their loyal, passionate and committed support.

The Taipans might not be playing for a finals spot but that won't mean they lack the motivation for a strong performance up against a Wildcats team still a chance to finish on top of the NBL table come the end of the regular season.

There are plenty of things to look out for on Monday night, including these five:

1. SETTING THE STAGE
The Taipans won't be lacking in motivation to put in a vastly improved performance in front of the home fans on Monday but at the same time the 'Cats can't afford to lose as they chase top spot

Coming into Monday's game to close Round 18 of the #NBL21 season the Wildcats might be still in a fight for top spot with the Taipans playing for nothing but pride, but performing better for themselves and their home fans should be plenty of motivation for the Snakes.

The Wildcats and Taipans had some cracking battles going back to last season culminating in their semi-final match up that went to three enthralling matches with the 'Cats only just managing to prevail with Game 3 in Perth on their way to making it back-to-back championships.

Now the Wildcats are right in the mix to chase the club's first ever championship three-peat but the season hasn’t gone to plan for the Taipans as they currently sit in bottom place and are now on a four-game losing skid.

Cairns comes into the game on Monday which will be their second last one at the Pop-Up Arena in front of the Orange Army for #NBL21 after a disappointing 29-point loss in Melbourne against the South East Melbourne Phoenix back on Friday night. Prior to that they had lost at home also to the Phoenix and Brisbane Bullets along with away to the Adelaide 36ers.

The last win for the Snakes was in Tasmania against the New Zealand and their last win over Perth back in Game 2 of the semi-final series last year at the Convention Centre.

At 7-22, obviously there isn’t a post-season for the Taipans to still be shooting for but taking pride in performance for yourself and your club, and indeed your supporters should count for a lot not to mention players are playing for their careers now to close out the season. That should all add up to the Snakes finding plenty of motivation for Monday's clash.

Quite simply, if the Wildcats still want to have a hope of grabbing top spot off Melbourne United, they can't drop this game. The 'Cats did lose at home to Melbourne back on Thursday night, but bounced back strongly in Brisbane on Saturday to start their run of three games in five days in Queensland.

Perth comes into Monday's game in Cairns on a 21-8 record to be just behind Melbourne who are now 21-7. A win for the Wildcats on Monday and the race for top spot is well and truly on and a loss at the same time, could leave them likely having to settle for second position.

Monday's game will also be the first time that Cairns have taken on the Wildcats minus Cam Oliver and with Venky Jois in the line-up, while it's also the first time the Snakes get a look at the 'Cats with Will Magnay having further strengthened their squad.

2. SWIFT RESPONSE ORDER OF THE DAY
There was precious little to like from the Taipans on Friday night in Melbourne against the Phoenix, but Monday offers a chance to quickly respond from that

The wins might have not been coming of late for the Cairns Taipans and some slow starts had been a concern, but the Snakes had been showing good fight to win their way back into contests for the most part.

That wasn’t so much the case on Friday night in Melbourne against the South East Melbourne Phoenix much to the disappointment of coach Mike Kelly.

The end result was a 106-77 victory for South East Melbourne with the Taipans ending up conceding 16 offensive rebounds for 27 second chance points while losing the battle on the glass by 12, having 15 turnovers and giving up a 36-point deficit at one point.

Taipans coach Mike Kelly was left flabbergasted with the way the last three quarters panned out on Friday night against the Phoenix, and was finding tough to find out how to explain what happened.

"I'm still trying to figure out what happened in this game. It's disappointing and South East Melbourne came out with great energy for the last three quarters and ran over top of us," Kelly said.

"We didn’t give them a lot of fight defensively and it's a little bit frustrating. There was no indication that we'd come out and play like that in the last three quarters especially."

3. OPPORTUNITIES ALREADY BEING OFFERED
There's not much the Taipans can do that they aren’t already in terms of giving all the players on the roster the chance to perform, now it's all up to them to come up with the right mindset to deliver

Strangely, there was a call to coach Mike Kelly after Friday night's loss to see if after that defeat he might start giving some more minutes to players further down the rotation.

Well for anyone who has been paying attention, that has been happening plenty in this back end of the season and the likes of Tad Dufelmeier, Mojave King, Fabijan Krslovic, George Blagojevic and Jordan Ngatai have all responded.

Each of those players have all developed significantly throughout this season even if it has been a challenging one overall for the team.

As a development player, Dufelmeier has shown that he has the ability to earn a full roster spot in the league next season while King is growing as he gets used to playing professionally and then Krslovic, Blagojevic and Ngatai have had their best seasons of their NBL careers.

Given Kelly has already been giving everyone in the Taipans squad plenty of opportunities, he's not necessarily there's an easy answer of what can be done differently, it's all about how the players come out and perform and what mindset they have.

"Everybody played in this game and Jarrod Kenny with four minutes and Fab with eight minutes played the least so I'm not sure what changes we can make in terms of giving guys more opportunity," Kelly said.

"But we'll try and figure it out. It's simple, you have to be mentally tough and physically tough, and in this game we weren’t that."

4. FIRST BATTLE IN TWO MONTHS
The Taipans and Wildcats have quite a history against one another, but this will be their first meeting in two months and the first of two clashes over the next week

It was now two months ago when the teams last met and that was the last game after the NBL Cup, and Cairns made the trip to Perth but the Wildcats came away with the 18-point victory on the back of a combined 49 points from Bryce Cotton and John Mooney.

The 'Cats came out on fire and Cotton took seven three-point attempts in the first quarter alone trying to make a statement. By late in the first term they led by 14 points, that grew to 20 shortly before half-time and from there the Taipans never got it back closer than 13.

Cairns did fight the game out but Perth was never in any real jeopardy at any point with Cotton delivering another 28 points and five assists while going 6/16 from deep.

Mooney was tremendous again with 21 points, eight rebounds and three assists while going an efficient 7/8 from the floor with Blanchfield contributing 17 points, five rebounds and two steals.

While Scott Machado had 16 points and four rebounds, he was without an assist for the second time in his NBL career. Kouat Noi had 14 points, nine rebounds, three assists and two steals, but 12 of his points came in the opening half.

Cam Oliver had just six points on 3/10 shooting, Mirko Djeric seven points on 3/10 shooting and Fabijan Krslovic fouled out in less than seven minutes. Next Star Mojave King was also scoreless on four shot attempts in 12 minutes.

Nate Jawai was a bright spark in the second half and finished with 13 points and five rebounds while Jordan Ngatai battled hard for 10 points.

The Taipans and Wildcats then do it all again against one another over in Perth on Friday night.

5. TIME TO MOVE ON FROM HARD LESSONS
The Taipans have tasted their share of hard lessons, coach Mike Kelly now wants to see the Snakes give full effort for the whole 40 minutes the rest of the season starting Monday night

Taipans coach Mike Kelly is asking nothing of his playing group coming into Monday night's game at home to the Wildcats except that they give everything they have to give, and leave nothing out on the floor.

There might have been hard lessons again learned Friday night against the Phoenix, but that's nothing new for the Taipans this season. 

All Kelly now asks of his group starting Monday against the Wildcats is they go out and give their all, and leave nothing on the court.

"I think all year there's been some hard lessons. We've been through ups and downs in Cairns over the last three years and all that we preach, and all that the people of Cairns care about is if these guys go out and play as hard as they can," Kelly said. 

"That's the first and foremost thing so that's what we will focus on. We've got some good players in this group and guys that can win basketball games in the NBL so we need to put that effort out there, and show that never say die attitude out on the floor every night so that we deserve to be there."