Fresh off an opening night victory over the Melbourne Tigers, the Sydney Kings did everything right for their home opener against the New Zealand Breakers. Off the court, at least.
The new management team of the Kings, spearheaded by the experience of Bob Turner, put together a finely polished night of entertainment to welcome the Kings back to Sydney. As a fan amongst the 8,533 in attendance, it was hard not to get caught up in the atmosphere.
The history of the Kings and the emotions evoked by their return were heavily drawn upon in the game night presentation. A fantastic highlights video was sewn together from the archives, bringing back vision of such favourites as Dwayne McClain, Shane Heal, Matty Nielsen, Steve Carfino, Leon Trimmingham and even current coach Ian “Moose” Robilliard in his playing days.
Celebrities flooded the courtside seats — well, as celebrity-like as Australia can offer — with X-Factor stars multiplying like rabbits, former Wallaby John Eales, Sydney AFL legend Paul Roos, Home & Away actors vying for crowd attention, David Koch’s Channel 7 Sunrise team all over the place and even the Premier Kristina Keneally. Old Kings connections like Dean Uhtoff, Rodney Overby and Brad Rosen roamed the Kingdome. Scarlett Belle and Justice Crew provided entertainment when the players were not on court and as always, the Lion was a massive draw card in getting the fans riled up. His connection to the Kings of yesteryear was particularly inspiring.
NBL top dog Larry Sengstock was monitoring proceedings as he stood in front of section 6 and looked pretty relieved that everything went off without a hitch. Everything that is, except the Kings performing on the court, against a Breakers team that was sans star Kirk Penney.
The New Zealanders started off with six unanswered points against a Kings side likely reeling in shock from a massive Friday night first-up win over the Tigers in Melbourne and a delayed flight back, caused by furious winds in Sydney on Saturday. However it wasn’t long before the Kings returned serve behind an aggressive Graeme Dann (who once again got the starting nod over import Taj McCullough) and star big man Julian Khazzouh (fresh off a 24 point-17 rebound night against Melbourne).
By the end of the first quarter, the Breakers had fallen behind 16-19 and the home crowd was pretty happy with the way things were looking. The lion got the crowd going with some of his trademark routines (the slingshot and the strip tease are always favourites) and everything was 1992 all over again.
Then the second quarter came. Sydney’s tempo was absolutely destroyed by a genius move by Breakers coach Andrej Lemanis in using full-court pressure against rookie point guard Luke Cooper. In combo with Dann and starting shooting guard Damien Ryan, Cooper was forced to take rushed measures to get the ball over half-court on every possession, totally throwing the half-court sets out of whack, meaning of course that Khazzouh was not presented with the same opportunities that he had enjoyed 24 hours earlier.
The result was a series of errant drives up the court, with one-out play by individuals, driving to the basket for ill-advised and generally unsuccessful lay-up attempts. By the end of the second period the Kings had been outscored 27-10 and things had turned around 180 degrees.
The half-time entertainment, whilst momentarily diverting the attention of Kings fans, could not totally erase the uneasy fact that the Kings had some serious work to do after the long break. Fortuitously, one thing that the Kings did not bring back from the 1990s for their return to the Kingdome was the “Cardiac Kids” label. The Cardiac Kids were known for their general propensity to crumble (yes, violet crumble) in the third quarter of games, surrendering seemingly safe leads and throwing games away to the dismay of ardent fans.
The 2010-11 Kings are now 40-31 in their two third quarters to date, as they took the game back into contention with a 23-17 period against the Breakers. The call was largely answered by imports McCullough and Rod Grizzard, who both provided scoring punch and some flashy athleticism.
Going into the final quarter, the score was 60-52 Breakers — a manageable deficit for the Kings, but one that the Kiwis would not sacrifice easily. The first six minutes of the final period saw plenty of ebbs and flows until finally a Khazzouh basket with 7:28 to go cut the deficit to one, at 61-62. That was as close as it would get for the home side, as Kevin Braswell, CJ Bruton, Alex Pledger, Mika Vukona and rising star Tom Abercrombie all pulled into an extra gear to put the game out of contention.
Some notes:
- Khazzouh scored 16 points on 7/11 from the field and clearly did not see enough of the ball due to the disruption to Sydney’s offence by the Breakers’ full-court defence.
- Defence was a particular failing by the Kings, as numerous easy interior baskets were scored by the Breakers as they made the extra pass. The return of Ben Knight from injury will no doubt help to address this deficiency. One King who can not be faulted in this area is certainly once again standout star Khazzouh. The big man had six blocks and three steals in the game, as he did his best to intimidate in the paint, a battle that was somewhat solitary (no other King recorded a block, although Grizzard did snare two steals).
- Outside shooting for the Kings was a particular failing on the night. Much like the rest of the team’s offence, a rushed, out-of-rhythm tempo forced them into shooting 3/17 from three-point range. Damien Ryan (2/6), Rod Grizzard (0/4) and Taj McCullough (1/3) were the main culprits for the shot count. Grizz in particular jacked up a few questionable bombs from deep in the fourth as the team tried to pull it back.
- Braswell off the bench for New Zealand was of particular impact. Despite Paul Henare being the starter at point guard, the import Braswell came in to put up 16 points and 3 assists.
- There were times early in the game where the Kings looked to particularly need the creative input of their imports, as the offence looked unstructured with a lot of swinging around the perimeter and little penetration. They did see flashes of brilliance from Grizzard (10 points, 8 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 steals, 2 turnovers) and McCullough (17 points, 5 rebounds, 2 assists) — however, the key failings of the two were Grizz’s poor shooting (4/13 FG) and McCullough’s ball control (4 turnovers).
- Dann’s play in 17 minutes as a starter were a microcosm of his career to date. One minute he’d be making a particularly impressive drive to the hoop, showing effortless ball control for a man of his height, the next he’d be committing one of his 3 turnovers. This season will see plenty of opportunities for Dann to perform on this roster and I would love to see him take advantage of the situation, as he has a tonne of upside.
- Abercrombie and Vukona’s aggression and dynamism were a key strength for the Breakers. Both forwards were all over the court, providing spark for the Breakers and pulled down 23 rebounds between them.
- Pledger, whilst not making much impact for the Tall Blacks in Turkey, was a solid presence inside for the Breakers in this game. He scored 14 points on 6/9 shooting in 19 minutes.
- When/if Penney comes back from his NBA try-outs for the Breakers, look out. This team is definitely championship material. It’s clear that the players that “warmed up” over the Turkish Summer at the FIBA World Championships are ready to go and in fine form.
[Boxscore]
Match reports from around the web:
Bonus: One fan’s ‘pap’ shots from the game.
Bonus 2: A bit of an idea of the atmosphere at the almost packed-out game.
