The bottom-placed New Zealand Breakers have sparked life into their NBL campaign with a stunning form reversal to defeat the Illawarra Hawks 90-67 on Wednesday night at Hobart's MyState Bank Arena.
Stinging from an embarrassing 24-point defeat at the hands of the Tasmania JackJumpers last Sunday, the Breakers flipped the script thanks to a committed defensive effort that held the high-scoring Hawks to just 33 points in the first half.
New Zealand launched a run of 11 straight points near the end of the opening quarter, import point guard Peyton Siva coming off the bench to provide some scoring punch, and rode the momentum to build a 19-point buffer by halftime.
Hawks swingman Antonius Cleveland fuelled a second-half turnaround thanks to a 16-point explosion in the third quarter as the visitors threatened to repeat their round three triumph - where they came back from 15 points down to beat the Breakers in double overtime.
But after Tyler Harvey drilled back-to-back three-pointers early in the final period to cut New Zealand's lead to eight, clutch long-range shooting from Rasmus Bach helped end the Hawks' charge as the Breakers closed out their third win of the season.
"Isn't it amazing ... to see the same team put together two different games," coach Dan Shamir said about the rapid turnaround in the space of three days.
"To defend a good team like the Hawks and keep them under 70 points, it's all about the simplest things in the game - the attitude, the mentality, the toughness, we rebounded the ball, defended, built the lead, kept it.
"Just to know that we can do that is great, also to know we can respond like that is also great. Now we just have to do it on a consistent basis."
Yanni Wetzell led all scorers with 22 points and added nine rebounds, while American Siva contributed 14 points and three steals in his return from a hamstring complaint.
The fourth-placed Hawks were aiming to record back-to-back victories for the first time since opening the season with three straight wins but coach Brian Goorjian admitted to feeling shellshocked after seeing his side capitulate under New Zealand's physical style of play.
"The physicality they brought to the defence we couldn't deal with and defensively we couldn't handle their on-ball (offence)," Goorjian said.
"We knew what was coming and we knew what the challenges were coming into the game so it wasn't a surprise."
The loss leaves the Hawks vulnerable to a chasing pack of four teams vying to climb into the top four and sets up an important home clash with league leaders South East Melbourne Phoenix on Monday.
