North Adelaide Rockets (64) defeated Southern Tigers (63)

The Rockets have had a challenging start to the season facing the top 4 teams on the ladder straight off the bat and they will be happy that they knocked the top placed Tigers down a rung whilst pulling themselves off the bottom and up to 9th position, even if it was by only 1 point.

Rockets hero Pero Vasiljevic returned to form making an impact with a double double shooting 22 points and racking up 16 rebounds. Vasiljevic made his presence felt early with a a pair of dunks in the first 5 minutes of play. Team mate John Wernham backed him up with 22 points and 9 rebounds of his own.

Tiger Samuel McDaniel kept the pace with 18 points and and 7 rebounds while Tim Smyth proved handy with 9 rebounds and 4 assists. 

With only one point in it this game could have gone either way and they traded the lead all night. The Rockets had a 4 point advantage at the first break after a strong start but the Tigers came back fighting in the second period and managed to wrestle a 1 point lead at the half time break. Then North rallied in the third and were up by 3 points as they headed into the final quarter. 

Daniel Goodluck got in early in the quarter with some sharp shooting for the Rockets before the Tigers' defence shut them down for 7 minutes without scoring while they clawed their way back into contention scoring 8 unanswered points followed by a 3 pointer from Codey Ellison bringing them to within 2 points with less than 10 seconds on the clock. Tim Smyth had a final chance with 2 shots but sadly for the Tigers he made one and missed one and the Rockets squeaked away with the win with time on their side. 

Top Scorers Rockets
Pero Vasiljevic 22
John Wernham 22
Daniel Goodluck 10

Top Scorers Tigers
Samuel McDaniel 18
Samuel Johns 15
Codey Ellison 11