Basketball: Wildcat's back among Hawks

Hawks v Rangers

NBL, Napier

In the world of systems and transitional play, it seems words of a more prosaic nature should resonate with any basketball fans contemplating the path of apathy.

"Don't fret just yet. It's not how you start but how you finish that matters," says Everard Bartlett not long after arriving from Australia this week.

The Perth Wildcat jetted back from ANBL commitments and was straight into the scrimmaging sessions here on Monday before tonight's fifth-round match against newcomers Waitakere Rangers in Napier.

"I've seen the potential of our players in two trainings and I was wondering how we've already lost three games," Bartlett says of the HBS Bank Hawks who are 1 and 3 before they tip off at the Pettigrew-Green Arena, Taradale, at 7pm in the Bartercard National Basketball League (NBL) today.

"We need to finish in the top four so it's early days and the fans should be out here supporting us," the versatile guard says of the Hawks, who have lost away to the Manawatu Jets and Taranaki Mountain Airs and succumbed to the Otago Nuggets at home.

The only victory for the Tab Baldwin-coached Hawks has come at home against former Hawks coach/player Paul Henare's Southland Sharks.

The smart money will go on the Hawks beating a winless Waitakere, although Bartlett cautions the visitors can be dangerous.

"They can play with no worries or pressure ... but we need to look at ourselves and dominate to get back on track."

The 27-year-old, whose Wildcats lost in the ANBL final to three-peat New Zealand Breakers, hasn't had Baldwin as mentor before although he is familiar with the former Tall Black coach's prowess for many years.

"I know his style of coaching has changed. The set plays and systems are different, but the defence is very similar to the Wildcats with rotation and up-tempo pressure," he says, adding that has made it somewhat easier for him to adapt comfortably.

"Tab's a great coach and he's pushing us at training because the [1-3] record needs to change."

While in Perth, Bartlett was keeping in touch with the Paora Winitana-led Hawks' games via internet stories and highlights on the NBL live stream.

With big man Kareem Johnson's immigration application overturned, he says the Hawks will have to look at other alternatives.

"It hurts. I was training last night with the boys and noticed we're quite small."

Other teams beat the Hawks not because they were better but simply because of foul trouble that meant imports Brian Greene and Darko Cohadarevic, in particular, had to be rested at pivotal times in the games.

Aidan Daly also sat on four fouls after absorbing a lion's share of game time from first-choice point guard and former Tall Black Jarrod Kenny, who was again limited because of an ongoing back injury.

"We were also out-rebounded, so if we're playing Tab's style, teams have to have possession and get everything off the board."

He hastens to highlight how the Sharks have rebounded under import Kevin Braswell to the tune of 30-point victories, something he feels the Hawks can emulate with court time to find a sense of cohesiveness.

The Wildcats, with 2006 NBL title-winning coach Shawn Dennis as their assistant coach, had set an ANBL record as the team that restricted an opposition last season to the lowest score - 52 points to the Crocodiles in Townsville, he suspected.

"Perth's shooting was one of the worst but they won games on possession last season," says Bay-born Bartlett, whose wife Lillian and children Haizley, 5, and 1-year-old Micah have settled in Napier where the youngsters are relishing renewing ties with their cousins and whanau.

He lauds Perth as having an admirable constitution akin to the Breakers'.

"They are definitely a great franchise and a team with credentials to make the [ANBL] play-offs for 27 years in a row.

"It's a great club to develop one's skills at the highest level of professionalism in the league," says Bartlett, championing its organisational structure and high-tech training facilities as he eagerly awaits another season with them.

"It's been tough, but we lost a big part of our team," he says of captain/point guard Damian Martin, who bowed out of the semifinals with injury. Martin was voted ANBL's defensive player of the year in 2011 and 2012.

"Unfortunately we weren't at full strength so the Breakers lifted the intensity with our one good defensive man down.

"We tried stepping into his [Martin's] shoes while maintaining our own roles but it was too much for [import guard] Kevin Lisch to do it on his own," he says of Lisch, who Perth named as their 2012-13 MVP.

He finished fourth in the NBL MVP and was named in the All-NBL First Team after averaging 15.2 points, 3 assists and a steal per game last season.

Bartlett says the Mika Vukona-captained Breakers deserved their three-peat with the prowess and experience of CJ Bruton and Dillon Boucher.

For now, he is enjoying the camaraderie of his home boys in Napier.

"They are an awesome bunch of guys and they have been very welcoming, so we're working out just fine."

Baldwin says Bartlett, who was the Hawks' leading scorer last season at 17.4 points a game, brings a little bit of what the Hawks already have.

"He has experience from the Perth Wildcats, bringing a higher skill and talent level but he has to integrate to our systems and the team," Baldwin says, thrilled to have Bartlett who brings a speed-and-pressure game to become a "very strong weapon".

"It's like he's been with us from the beginning."

At the risk of sounding cliched, he labels Bartlett an outstanding individual who will bring the Wildcats' pressure defence but will endeavour to embrace and incorporate the offensive aspects the coach is employing from his experience in the Northern Hemisphere.

"Everard has better perimeter shooting so he'll be a big help to us in the offence."

While the fans' expectations will be for the Hawks to win against Waitakere tonight "we [Hawks] have to say we are desperate to win.

"We need to play good basketball and not have bits of bad or slow patches that have let the opposition back into the game."

It will be tough ask for the last-placed Rangers to win here tonight although the young outfit have the capacity to lash out when their backs are to the wall.

On their pothole-filled road, Waitakere have lost by a solitary point to the Manawatu Jets.

The Aik Ho-coached Rangers need to retain possession amid damning statistics that places them on the top of NBL sides conceding first in most turnovers, averaging around 21 a game.