This Weekly WABL Wrap is brought to you by Baskin Robbins East Victoria Park (828a Albany Highway, East Victoria Park). Why not take the opportunity to show them your support? Head into the store for some cool and yummy ice-cream action after your game!
Here’s how our Round 7 WABL games went!
Women’s results and coach comments
12 RED – Joshua Wallace
Won against the Warwick Senators 54-44
Josh loved seeing:
- The girls’ start to the game was fantastic and an area we hadn’t been great in over the past few games. They got themselves off to an 8-0 start and led the game from start to finish.
- Leeshar and Mafa Tuialii rotated between guarding the opposition’s strongest player and held her to 6 points for the game (she averages 16ppg)
- Anna Zittritsch had her best game of the season, showing improvement in split line help and offensive spacing
- Michelle Ninyette led the way in the first half with 13 points off the back of her ability to cause turnovers on defence
12 WHITE – John Care
Lost to Lakeside 33-14
John loved seeing:
- Our hustle today in the backcourt with girls helping the double team was really good and also our spacing was better than previous weeks.
- Mila Reyes had an amazing game in both offence and defence today. She dominated in offence scoring 14 points and her hustle in defence gave her countless steals, intercepts and involvement in many jump balls. It was fantastic to see.
14 RED – Bri Bailey
Won against Senators 39-38
Bri loved seeing:
- The girls stuck together and backed each other while it was tough going play by play to try and stay up.
- Ashlyn Steers. Her effort and work don’t go unnoticed. Even though she doesn’t score as much, her effort is 100% every time she’s on the court. She does the little things right all game and helps everyone else get open because of how hard she works.
14 WHITE – Haylee Smyth
Lost to Willetton 56-41
Hayley loved seeing:
- Miki Deshon has been great with ball in hand. Her ability to continuously get through double teams and create scores for our team has been great.
- Ebony Cox is showing good signs of improvement, she is getting a good understanding of defensive principles.
14 BLACK – Zac Belton
Lost to Warwick 31-27
Zac loved seeing:
- I was most pleased with our team’s resilience to not drop their heads and continue fighting. The girls were able to come back from a 9 point deficit in a matter of minutes as we closed the gap down to 1 point. Unfortunately, Senators pulled away for one terrific ending to a game.
- Talia Bentley really stepped up in crunch time delivering a dagger of a 3-pointer, she also played a terrific level of defence.
- Alex Temby who really took my words to heart and relaxed out there a bit more today – letting the game flow to her she was able to make some really good decisions on the floor.
16 RED – Adrian Warner
Lost to Joondalup 69-38
Adrian loved seeing:
- We had a much better start to the game than previous weeks and it was a 1 pt game at quarter time.
- Caitlin Lea was very strong on the defensive boards, ran the floor well in transition and made several good layups under pressure, and consistently looked to attack the paint. It was great to welcome Chloe Hind back after several weeks off the court with a broken finger and she slotted in smoothly and made a solid contribution.
16 WHITE – Anne-Marie and Bryn Arnold
Lost to Warwick Senators 56-29
Anne-Marie and Bryn loved seeing:
- We worked hard and the effort was there. It was just our execution that let us down.
- Megan Taylor top scored with 11.
- Mia Connors has a solid game.
18 RED – Brayden Cook
Lost to Joondalup Wolves 64-42
Brayden loved seeing:
- Lucy Dowling back on court after missing the last two games with injury.
Men’s results and coach comments
12 RED – Brad Dowd
Lost to Joondalup Wolves 77-67
Brad loved seeing:
- We had a great first quarter but lost our way in the second. Held our own in the third and mounted a great comeback in the 4th to be only down by 5 with minutes to go, but it wasn’t enough due to foul trouble.
- Zak Magdy again shot accurately with 60% from the field and Anthony Flores played his best offensive game of the season for us scoring 16 points including 2/3 from beyond the arc.
12 BLACK – Ron Flores
Lost to Warwick Green 56-33
Ron loved seeing:
- When we moved the ball we were able to score quick points.
- Aiden Cooper was a standout performer. He played a good basketball game by making good basketball plays.
- Jackson Doyle has been leading this team with his efforts all season and this game was no different. He has really accepted the challenge I have given him and stepped into the role really well.
12 WHITE – Dylan Vilardi
Lost to Joondalup 57-44
Dylan loved seeing:
- The boys did a great job staying in the game and brought the deficit down from 13 at one point to only 5 points in the fourth quarter. Unfortunately, Joondalup just played that 2% harder than us and they ended up walking away with the win
- Seb Doyle did a great job to keep his head in the game. He was disappointed in himself at quarter time because he missed a couple of easy shots, but he went back out there, was cutting and rebounding with purpose, and did his role with 100% effort while he was out there. Terrific game by Seb
12 GREY – Jacob Kelly
BYE
14 RED – Colin Driscoll
Lost to Joondalup 66-44
Colin loved seeing:
- Our players became a team today. The final score is not a reflection of what they showed in this game.
- Declan Kenny is starting to create a presence in the middle. His control of defensive boards develops each game and today, in the first half in particular against a much bigger opponent, Declan was the chairman.
14 BLACK – Ash Brian
Lost to Hills Raiders 56-34
Ash loved seeing:
- Generally, our strength is our ability to protect the paint and our rebounding. In this game, all of our players looked small! The opposition guards were the height of our forwards and the opposition forwards towered above everyone. Despite this, we moved the ball better than any other week because that was the only way we could penetrate their half-court D.
- From a defensive point of view, we protected the paint very well in the half-court and made it very difficult for their gigantors to score. In the end, it was more our inability to break their press that cost us the game.
14 WHITE – Al Lackovic
Won against Joondalup White 73-38
Al loved seeing:
- We achieved the following game goals:
- Execute our team game plan for 4 quarters
- Team Pressure & contain
- Win the Rebound count (paint beasts)
- Under our T/O count
- Be competitors every play
- Together dominate
- Individually:
- Jerry Davies – Dominated both ends of the floor and had a career-best game.
- Ben Galvin – Paint beast attitude & constant screening
- Jack Saliacus – Owning the paint and rewarding the guards for their pressure with 2 first-half pass intercept steals.
- Zac Anfuso – Relentless work rate at both ends of the floor, feeding assists, constant talk & support, attacking the ring and rebounding like a centre.
- Romeo Lyszkowicz – Playing big, defending big, feeding assists and constant positive team support.
- James Bowen – Attacking driving lanes, making great reads, finishing.
- Hamish Gibson – Defence warrior who worked at 100% and made great decision after great decision.
- Kade Mendes – Defended the opposition like a glove, transitioned with speed and fed the wings/centre cherry ripe assists.
14 GREY – CJ Jackson
Lost to Lakeside Lightning 69-58 (thank you to CJ for stepping in to coach at the last second with regular coach Alex Maude out with concussion)
CJ loved seeing:
- The players allowed me to coach them and teach them new game situations that they never trained leading up to the game.
- All players played well and aggressively.
16 RED – Luke Notley
Won against Lakeside 86-68
Luke loved seeing:
- Our first-half defensive intensity was much better this week. We still need to close out shooters a bit better and not give teams second chance shots but we were able to exploit Lakeside’s weak defensive transition by getting out on the fast break a large portion of time.
- Finn Warner played an awesome defensive role locking down their big guy (6 ft 5″) who scores a large chunk of their points. Zviko Tinayenda’s defensive intensity was fantastic and led to turnovers from Lakeside and us able to convert some easy layups. Jake Vilardi played an awesome off-the-bench role and was defensively our best bench player – exactly what the team needs, well done Jake!
16 BLACK – Bevan Rankin
Won against Joondalup 83-75
Bevan loved seeing:
- That we did not play close to our best but managed to grind out a win.
- Kade McMillan was again outstanding on the offensive end scoring a game-high 30 points.
- Ben Plewright was Mr Consistent again playing a significant amount of minutes and standing up when needed.
- Our bigs were again solid today led by Ethan Saliacus who was an absolute monster on the boards and came up big with some points in the paint.
16 WHITE – Mark Edman
Lost to Warwick 101 to 45
Mark loved seeing:
- We came out solid in the first quarter on defence
- Harrison Clarke played with composure.
- Taj Racey didn’t stop trying
16 GREY – Michael Riley
BYE
18 RED – Gavin Burnett
Lost to South West Slammers 85-75
Gavin loved seeing:
- The resilience shown by this squad on the weekend after multiple setbacks was inspiring. From an initial squad of 15, we were down to nine players after our Captain, Harper Gadsby was injured during the week. We also lost our leading scorer, Joshua Draper early in the game to injury, which left us with only eight fit players against a South West Slammers team that boasted no less than four quality SBL players. Every single player stepped up and played their role, rebounding, running, playing aggressive defence and moving the ball with speed and precision. It took some incredible outside shooting form long range to get them over the line. We left nothing on the court and walked off with heads held high.
- Every player in the team contributed with hard running in defence, aggressive on-ball defence, rebounding, spacing and rapid ball movement. It wouldn’t be fair to highlight any one particular player this week given that it was probably the most team-oriented game that this young squad has played. Owen Pang, Connor Rothman, Tobey Martin and Cooper Mason played great defensive games, while Owen and Tobey also contributed heavily on the scoreboard as well. Mitch Nixon, Vic Komaiya, Riley Burnett and Ryan Duke-Yonge were strong on the boards and ran hard in defence. We lost Josh Draper early in the game just as he was starting to make his presence felt on court.
18 WHITE – Simon Daff
Lost to Perry Lakes Hawks White 75-70
Simon loved seeing:
- That we never gave up. We didn’t play very well but still had a chance to win it at the end.
- Ethan Port-Louis had another solid game as captain – his energy and talk are always a highlight. Rory Charles and Maxx Della Franca were also solid with their all-round play. Both hustled and rebounded well and contributed at both ends.
18 GREY – Carlos Uribe
Won against East Perth 82-57
Carlos loved seeing:
- Our new gap defence worked very well even with very little practice on it. Very glad to see the effort the team put on the help and how all players maintained the good level in the court
- Abdullahi Mohamedhashi, Kaden Morcombe and Luis Uribe were the best players for this game. They kept the rebounding, good defence and attack at a high level
20 RED – David Swaby
Won against Willetton Tigers 81-59
Dave loved seeing:
- Our defensive effort was consistent all game and every player contributed on that end.
- It has become the norm but Lachlan Bertram had another solid scoring performance keeping pressure on the opponent’s defence. Ronan Coppin had a great overall game being extremely disruptive defensively not allowing them to smoothly run their offense while having a great offensive game himself.
20 BLACK – Luke Simonette
Lost to Perry Lakes 100-63
Luke loved seeing:
- Our willingness to fight on after going down substantially very early in the game. Our second half defensive effort was great. Offensive execution is getting better. Accountability on rebounds/boxing out and getting 50/50s is growing
- Evander Bennell provided great scoring punch
- James Vergary showed maturity vs a press
- Caleb Norman provided excellent leadership