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The Breakers head into Thursday night's sudden-death quarter-final against the Adelaide 36ers having buried a few demons.
The New Zealand ANBL club closed their regular season with a 107-97 victory over Sydney Spirit on Saturday night, snapping a five-game losing skid across the Tasman.
The club's first victory of the year on Aussie pine was their second straight, following Thursday night's thrashing of Cairns Taipans.
While it could have been substantially better had they not lost 10 of their last 13 matches, an 18-12 record represented the club's best return in six seasons in the league, topping last year's 16-14 effort.
The dates for the early stages of the playoffs have been set. Should the Breakers get past the 36ers - as they will be strong favourites to - they will take on the Tigers in a best of three series that begins the following Wednesday at Melbourne's State Netball Hockey Centre.
A storming final quarter saw the CJ Bruton-inspired Breakers overcome the Spirit after trailing for the first three quarters. The veteran point guard top scored with 30 points, including six of eight three pointers.
The visitors only warmed to their task in the final quarter at Olympic Park after trailing for much of the contest against the eighth-placed Spirit, who suffered their eighth consecutive defeat in what will likely be their final match before being wound up.
Led by Bruton and 16 final-quarter points from benchman Phill Jones, who ended with 23 in all, the Breakers won the final quarter 36-22.
Other contributors were a subdued Kirk Penney and Oscar Forman, with 15 points apiece, while Spirit captain Jason Smith topscored with 20 for the hosts.
Smith, a veteran Australian guard, was given a standing ovation when he was subbed off in the dying seconds.
Earlier, both teams stood for a minute's silence and the Spirit wore black tape on their singlets as a mark of respect for the Victorian bushfire victims.
All players from the cash-strapped Spirit agreed to donate their match payments to the bushfire relief fund.
The last time teams met in Sydney, in January, the hosts scraped home 86-85 with a late freethrow.
The Breakers trailed 48-49 at halftime after Bruton carried them through a patchy first 24 minutes.
The visitors shot just 37 per cent from the field in the first half, with Penney - the league's leading scorer - making a cold start with just two of 10, including one of eight three-point attempts.
Bruton got the Breakers going with back-to-back three-pointers but their defence was leaky as the Spirit sneaked to a 25-24 lead at the first break.
At halftime Bruton had 17 of the Breakers' 48 points, with big Tony Ronaldson the only other significant scorer. The Spirit held their lead throughout the third quarter and boosted it to seven at one stage, as Penney finally came to life with nine points in the period.
