By Kieren Vartuli

Southern Tigers 60 | North Adelaide Rockets 50

The North Adelaide Rockets hosted the Southern Tigers in their last season matchup before the finals next week. With both sides fighting for the second position, the matchup was set to be both entertaining and tough basketball.

After winning the opening tip, the Rockets were able to get onto the scoreboard first by Sarah Elsworthy heading to the line for two. Although after a slow start by the visitors, they were able to open their tally after grabbing an offensive rebound and scoring the second chance points. From here on, the tigers controlled the quarter by going on a 15-1 run. After warming up from the field, the margin was set at 12pts with 3 minutes to go. With both sides fighting for control, both clubs were in foul trouble with under half a quarter remaining. After North Adelaide forcing turnovers, they were able to cut the margin down to 8-points. Despite the hosts struggling from the field they were able to only be down 10 at the end of the first.

With the chance of a comeback still high, the Rockets came out of the 1^st break strong as they were able to cut the lead down to 6 before the Tigers pushed the lead out to 16. The tale of the evening for the Rockets was their struggles to guard the Tigers in the paint. They gave up a total of 40-points in the paint compared to the Tigers’ 14.The woes continued for the remainder of the quarter with their struggles from the field continuing. Although, the Rockets was able to end the half, on a high by forcing a Tigers turnover on the final shot. With this, the Tiger lead was still quite high at 18-points.

The halftime break was important for the Rockets to regain some composure and calm some last fixture nerves. With a new line-up coming onto the floor with some fresh legs the Rockets were able to slowly chip away at the margin. To add to their troubles, Sarah Elsworthy left the game with a knee injury and did not return. Despite it being a tough night from the field, the Rockets were able to cut the margin down to 12-points at the end of the third. Notably, the final plays for the Rockets were excellent displays as they were able to force a shot clock violation and then score off that turnover. This was no ordinary attempt; this was a deep triple by Courtney Hanson, which hyped up the crowd and helped spark an unbelievable Rockets comeback.

Coming off that unbelievable buzzer beater, the Rockets continued their momentum by eventually cutting back the margin to 1-point through excellent plays by many of the team including Jo Hill. Jo Hill (6-points, 10 rebounds) showed some excellence by helping cut the margin to 3-points and then taking a charge in the next play to take back possession. Game top scorer (16-points) Opal Mader had little trouble also contributing to the comeback as she found the bottom of the net in 40% of her attempts. Despite these girls gameplay, the Tigers shared the ball around well and had 3 players in double figures. Tara Robinson, Ta’rea Cunnigan and Jemma Thacker scored 13, 15, 12 respectively as well as combining for 23 rebounds.

After trading baskets in the fourth term for the lead, Denelle Fawcet evened the game at 50 apiece and helped spark the final push for the Tigers. With the game being able to go either way, Tara Robinson drained a difficult triple with Jo Hill’s hand in her face to stop some Rocket momentum. From here on, the Tigers were able to expand the lead to 10-points and comfortably take their final regular season win.