TUESDAY night proved no problem for the Merriwa Tavern & Bistro Joondalup City Wolves with both Men's and Women's teams beating the Kalamunda Eastern Suns by a combined 71 points at Joondalup Basketball Stadium.

The Week 18 matches were rescheduled from Saturday to Tuesday night and they saw the Lady Wolfpack defeat the Eastern Suns 78-56 and then the Wolves Men beat the Suns 154-105 to close the evening.

The win sees Joondalup's Women return to the top of standings ahead of the Rockingham Flames at 17-3 with two rounds of the 2016 regular season remaining while the Wolfpack Men improve to 20-4 to be just behind the league-leading Cockburn Cougars with the two to meet at Wally Hagan Stadium in the final round.

The Eastern Suns Women remain in eighth position with the loss with a 9-11 record to be just ahead of the 8-12 Cockburn Cougars while the Suns Men couldn’t quite back up their incredibly high-scoring 159-123 win over the Mandurah Magic on Friday night to slip to a 6-18 record.

Week 18 Friday night SBL wrap 
Week 18 Saturday night SBL wrap 
Week 18 Sunday SBL wrap 

Starting with Tuesday's Women's contest that could very well prove to be a preview of the first round of the playoffs, the Wolves got off to a hot start leading 7-2 early but by the end of the first period the Suns had drawn level.

But the Wolfpack threatened to pull away in the second quarter to lead by 10 at half-time and then put the contest away in the third quarter with 28 points to 11 to set up the eventual 22-point victory.

Neither team had a great shooting night with Joondalup going 30-of-89 from the floor at 33 per cent and Kalamunda 21-of-68 at 30 per cent but the Wolves dominated the glass with 57 rebounds to 38 while also forcing the Suns into 21 turnovers and scoring 25 points from those.

Wolfpack coach Craig Friday was particularly happy with his team's third quarter that set up the win and to get through unscathed with a win given some of the challenges of having to play on Tuesday night.

"I was disappointed with the first half. I thought we lacked a bit of discipline and maybe playing a game on Tuesday night is a bit different and took us some time to adjust," Friday said.

"But that third quarter we were pretty good and it got a bit scrappy towards the end in the fourth. But we got the W and got out of it injury-free which is nice.

"It was a bit different because normally Tuesday night is our hard night on the track so we go at each other, and throw in a bit of scouting for the team we play next week.

"We'll see how we go later in the week having not been able to do that and for me getting away from work was tough and I know it was for a few of the girls. But credit to them for coming out after half-time switched on and executed pretty well."

Klara Wischer was the star of the night for the Lady Wolfpack finishing with 31 points, 17 rebounds, five assists and three steals on the back of shooting 11-of-26 from the floor, 4-of-7 from three-point territory and 5-of-5 from the free-throw line.

Amy Kidner added 13 points and four rebounds for the Wolves, Ellyce Ironmonger 10 points, 15 boards and four assists, Nikita-Lee Martin nine points, eight rebounds and four assists and Shani Amos seven points, nine boards, six assists and three steals.

Stacey Barr managed to deliver 16 points, nine rebounds, four assists, three steals and two blocked shots for the Eastern Suns despite shooting just 5-of-19 from the floor.

Carley Mijovic added 12 points and nine rebounds for Kalamunda and Jorjah Smith 10 points.

Then in the Men's contest, there was always likely going to be plenty of points pup up considering the Wolves beat the Suns by a massive 68 points just three weeks ago and with Kalamunda coming off scoring 159 points against Mandurah on Friday.

The Wolves were in control from the outset with Kevin Davis a dominant presence inside and the Suns having no answer for his work around the basket. The majority of his 13 field goals for the night turned out to either be one or two-handed slams.

But in the first half the Eastern Suns were still managing to put up plenty of points despite being down by 16 at quarter-time and 20 at the half, but the Wolfpack stamped their authority in the third period putting up another 30 points and holding Kalamunda to just five to set up the eventual 49-point win.

The Wolves ended up shooting 55-of-107 from the field at 51 per cent and 20-of-46 at 43 per cent from three with the Suns going 41-of-96 at 42 per cent and 11-of-34 from three at 32 per cent. The Wolfpack pulled in 57 rebounds to 45 and caused 26 turnovers scoring 39 points from those.

Wolves coach Ben Ettridge didn’t feel like the Tuesday night game was much of a problem considering it's usually their hardest practice session anyway.

"For us our usual routine is Tuesday and Thursday night training, and at this stage of the year we tend to use Tuesdays for our hard session and Thursdays for our walkthrough," Ettridge said.

"Not that we treated this like a practice session by any means, but it wasn’t really a break to our routine being here on a Tuesday and having to front up to play a game of basketball."

The style the Eastern Suns are playing in 2016 meant that there was going to be plenty of points put up during the game. While Ettridge didn’t necessarily like that, holding Kalamunda to five points in the third period was something he was satisfied with.

"We got to play our kids and got everyone through without an injury, which is good, but it's a different style of basketball and not one that I would teach or a lot of people around the league would teach," Ettridge said.

"You just to be mentally tough and to do what we did in that third quarter was when we challenged our guys to not let them get to double-figures and we saw the fruits of our labour there with a five-point quarter and two of them were two free-throws with 30 seconds to go. That's a pretty big statement from us."

Joondalup came in without Damian Matacz and Reece Maxwell but still had plenty of depth with Davis leading the way with 34 points, 21 rebounds, three blocks and two assists.

Rob Huntington added 19 points, four rebounds, three blocks and two assists as well for the Wolves while Trian Iliadis finished with 18 points, nine assists and eight boards and Seb Salinas 17 points, four rebounds and four assists.

Greg Hire also had 16 points, nine assists and seven rebounds for the Wolfpack, Jordan Wellsteed 12 points, Sean Easther 11 points and five rebounds, and Joel Questel 11 points, three boards, two assists and two steals.

The Suns were missing retiring veterans Jarrad Prior and Travis McIlroy with import Brandon McGill also not suiting up. Ryan Blanchett top-scored for the visitors with 17 points and seven rebounds.

Nathan Drown added 16 points for the Eastern Suns, Tim Squire 14 points, four rebounds and four steals, Courtney Belger 13 points, Madison Stoveld 12 points and 14 boards, Geordie Murray 12 points and Jamon Child 10.

TUESDAY WOMEN'S SBL MATCHES
Merriwa Tavern & Bistro Joondalup City Wolves 78 defeated P&J Financial Solutions Kalamunda Eastern Suns 56

TUESDAY MEN'S SBL MATCHES
Merriwa Tavern & Bistro Joondalup City Wolves 154 defeated Kalamunda Eastern Suns 105

Article by Chris Pike
Photo by Serene-Elise Photography