Hawks face intense Heat tonight

HAMISH BIDWELL
Establishing an outside shooting threat looms as the key for the Hawks ahead of tonight's must-win home NBL match against the Harbour Heat.
That may sound slightly strange given that the Heat beat the 0800 Easy LPG-sponsored Hawks by 19 points earlier this season but, nevertheless, that's the verdict of American import Dusty Rychart. The power forward says the Hawks have to produce an outside threat in order to have any chance of breaking down the Heat's suffocating zone defence.
With top-scorer Paora Winitana back after missing Sunday's 98-71 loss to the Canterbury Rams, Rychart says the team has just the man to do it.
"There's more to that Christchurch game than us just not playing well on defence," said the Adelaide 36ers star.
"We're not like teams like Wellington or Auckland that go two or three deep on their bench. We don't have players who can come in off the bench and score, so missing Paora was pretty much a killer.
"Usually when I play in the Australian NBL I can hit the mid-range jumper and crash the boards and force myself inside but we've got a different offence here. Right now we just need an outside shooter to break that zone down.
"We don't have that luxury of being able to move the ball inside to a big Shaq-like figure, so we have to shoot the ball well."
At just over 17 points a game, Winitana leads the Hawks' scorers this season and that offence was sorely missed in the loss to the Rams. It was a defeat which plunged the team back into the pack with just seven wins from their 12 matches.
On the surface it could have dealt the sixth-placed Hawks' play-off chances a critical blow but in Rychart's opinion a 50 percent winning record in the six remaining matches should still be enough to clinch the team a top-four spot.
"If you look at the top team in the league, they've had five losses and we've had five losses. Even if we lose tonight and go to six losses we're still going to be in the hunt.
"The league is so even that you go in to every game knowing that if you don't execute your offence, then you're not going to win."
Rychart has played in competitions where there were always plenty of also-rans but not this one. Every team is capable of beating each other, so the eventual winner will certainly be the one who is the toughest mentally.
"It's good for you as a player, because it always keeps your mind on the job," he said. "We could go on a bit of a run and win all of our remaining games and maybe even finish in the first two. It's definitely achievable but given the toughness of the competition, it's probably unlikely."
Without a great deal of size to their roster, Rychart says the Heat rely on playing an aggressive, in-your-face defence. But there'll be no excuses for not adapting to that tonight and he and the Hawks simply have to stick to their own systems.