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KEY POINTS:
Confidence can be a fleeting commodity but it appears to have returned to the Breakers at just the right time as they continue their quest to become the first New Zealand sports team to win a transtasman club championship.
The players couldn't have been more pumped had they
just received a shot of adrenalin straight to a main artery after their club record 131-point offensive outburst in a crushing quarterfinal victory over Adelaide.
With 81 of those points coming in a torrid second half when the game was still very much on the line, the performance has primed the club perfectly for the three game semifinal series against the title-favourite Tigers, which begins in Melbourne on Wednesday.
The dark days of January have certainly been forgotten.
There were no shortage of positives on Thursday night. Star player Kirk Penney was well and truly back in the groove, connecting with five of nine three-pointers as part of his 31-point haul. And key playmaker CJ Bruton looked to be the player the club thought he was when they signed him - a leader who lives for the big post-season occasion.
A cold second quarter aside, the Breakers looked much more like the team that spanked Melbourne 120-111 in round two than the side that lost eight of nine games between January 2 and February 7. That horror run included back-to-back defeats to the Tigers in the space of three days, although the Breakers did square the season series 2-2 after posting home-and-away wins in the early rounds.
After entering the season as title favourites the Tigers made a slow start and lost influential Boomer Sam Mackinnon for the season with blood clots on his lungs. But after re- balancing their line-up by swapping import Rod Grizzard for former favourite Dave Thomas and bringing in Luke Kendall for Mackinnon, they produced a storming finish.
At one stage they won eight straight to overhaul the slumping Breakers and claim second place on the ladder, although they did cool off, losing two of their past three.
The Tigers may have home advantage for two of the three matches but, after sitting out the quarterfinals with a bye, they won't have played for 10 days when they meet the Breakers on Wednesday night.
Such an extended lay-off can cut both ways. The Tigers will be physically rejuvenated but could also be caught cold.
Although they won't say as much, the Breakers will know their best chance of winning the series is to produce a smash-and-grab raid in game one and then finish the job in Auckland on Friday night. "I remember winning a championship as a player against Melbourne Tigers when we lost the first game," coach Andrej Lemanis said.
"It is played over three games. You get three shots at it. Obviously winning the first game would be nice but you just come out and play hoops.
"What happens, happens."
Bruton, who exploded in the fourth quarter against Adelaide with five consecutive three-pointers, said the Breakers would enter the series brimming with confidence.
"They finished above us and you'd expect them to win and around the league the talk at the beginning of the year was that this trophy is staying in Melbourne," Bruton said.
"We are here to prove that wrong. We have every opportunity to do so and we have nothing to lose. We have the whole of New Zealand behind us and they [only] have little Melbourne."
Having being pounded into submission by the full-strength Breakers after earlier posting successive victories over weakened Breakers line-ups, Adelaide captain Brett Maher believed the New Zealand team were well capable of beating the Tigers and pushing on to the Grand Final series.
"We've rated the Breakers pretty highly all year," Maher said.
"They had that slump when they had a few injuries but they all seem to be healthy and they are very dangerous team. They could knock off anyone in that top four, I believe."
They will be underdogs, certainly, but with his side now firmly back in the groove, Lemanis will be quietly confident that the Tigers can be tamed. "We've had good battles with them all year," he said. "We've played them four times and all of the games have been good games. They present their challenges as all teams do but we'll have our strategies ... the ball will fall where it will."
BREAKERS V TIGERS
(Best of three)
Game 1: Wed Feb 25, Melbourne
Game 2: Fri Feb 27, North Shore Events Centre
Game 3: Sun March 1, Melbourne (if required)
Head to head this season:
Rd 2: Breakers 120-11, Auckland
Rd 11: Breakers 86-84, Melbourne
Rd 24: Tigers 103-85, Auckland
Rd 25: Tigers 95-89, Melbourne
