If Brett Stibners had his way, he’d probably play more games on the road.
“I actually like being away on the road because your sole focus is basketball. At home you’re distracted by family and work. Once you’re in the bus on the way to the airport you’re around your teammates and you’re there for basketball.”
“Travelling is a little bit difficult with a disabled team. Extra wheelchairs, wheel bags, a lot more luggage that you would normally have travelling on a holiday...but we all contribute and help out and we get it done.”
The Roller Hawks travel to Adelaide this weekend to take on the Thunder after winning all three games against the Spinning Bullets in Brisbane.
“Very tough games. Brisbane are young so they pushed the full 40 minutes, they rotated their players, it was tough. The score doesn’t really reflect how hard the games were.”
“The focus was on defence but we did have lapses still. We found when we moved the ball in offence it made it a lot easier on us, we got open shots and ‘Aupie’ (Michael Auprince) got under the basket, he shot 75% for the weekend and that makes a huge difference for us.”
Stibners was brilliant across all three games, averaging close to a triple double, although he’s critical of his shooting performance in Sunday’s game.
“I’m lucky I’ve got Luke, Nick and Aupie to share that load and in that third game Hannah (Dodd) and Tim Markcrow made some really tough shots going to the basket so that’s the kind of thing we’re going to need going forward.”
The Roller Hawks will need everyone on their game in the coming weeks as they take on Perth and Kilsyth, last year’s grand finalists, in the final rounds of the regular season.
Kilsyth and Perth also swept their opponents on the weekend to move into second and third respectively with Kilsyth in particular hot on the heels of Wollongong with games in hand.
“We’re certainly not getting ahead of ourselves. We might be on top of the table but we do play the two strongest teams in the comp in the last two rounds,” says coach Brendan Dowler.
Before Wollongong face either Kilsyth or Perth they must first overcome Adelaide who have faced a tough initiation in their return to the NWBL.
“We’re notorious for playing down to teams so we’ll win but it’s how we’ll win... it’s putting those processes in place and sticking to them,” says Stibners.
“It’s an exciting weekend for other guys as well because they’ll be able to get a lot more time and be able to contribute on court. It’ll be a great opportunity for guys like Clay (Kelly) and Brad (Fisher) to get a lot more minutes and get their confidence up leading into the finals.”
Although the Roller Hawks should win comfortably, Dowler says there’s a lot to be taken out of the games.
“It’s an opportunity for us to work on the things we need to work on but also maintain our standards.”
“It’d be very disappointing if we let our standards drop this weekend so it’s another challenge in a way to keep our standards up and improve our game even against the team currently struggling in the league.”
The Roller Hawks’ next home fixtures are against Perth from July 7-9.
ROLLER HAWKS ROUND 5 GAMES
Saturday July 1: ADELAIDE THUNDER vs ROLLER HAWKS - 4:30pm @ Port Adelaide Recreation Centre, SA
Sunday July 2: ADELAIDE THUNDER vs ROLLER HAWKS - 11am @ Port Adelaide Recreation Centre, SA