Adelaide 36ers coach Joey Wright says lingering jet lag no excuse for sluggish start to NBL season

Lingering jet lag was no excuse for the Adelaide 36ers’ slow start against Sydney on Saturday night with coach Joey Wright saying they simply had to find something but couldn’t.

Coach Joey Wright speaks with his players during Adelaide 36ers’ loss to Sydney Kings on Saturday night. Picture: Craig Golding (AAP).

ADELAIDE 36ers coach Joey Wright says any lingering jet lag from last week’s trip to Utah is no excuse for the 22-point loss to Sydney on Saturday night.

The Sixers will return to training on Monday to prepare for their home opener against Brisbane at the Entertainment Centre this weekend after being blown away by the Kings in the opening quarter and losing 102-80.

The game was four days after they returned from the US where they lost to the Utah Jazz by 52 points.

“It can’t be (a reason for the slow start) that’s just the bottom line,” Wright said.

“You’ve got to find a way, all of us have something inside us that’s more than what we want to give, what’s more than convenient to give and you’ve just got to go there, and we didn’t do that.”

Wright blamed “second effort issues” for the loss, saying giving the Kings 16 offensive rebounds was too much and his bigs including Eric Griffin and Harry Froling had to play smarter to avoid early foul trouble. Import Griffin fouled out of the game in just nine minutes of court time.

“Our bigs have got to be smarter, for those guys to pick up three really hurts,” he said.

“I thought Obi (Kyei) got in and did a really good job so maybe that was a blessing in disguise that we see we can get a little bit more out of him, but Eric (Griffin) playing nine minutes it’s going to be hard for us to beat anybody.”

Jerome Randle had 16 points in his first game for Adelaide in two years on the weekend. Picture: Craig Golding (AAP).

Daniel Johnson top scored with 26 points for Adelaide while Jerome Randle had 16 in his return to the Sixers’ team after admitting he was “flat”.

“I was flat for sure, I’m going to put that on myself, but we have to keep working, this week will be really good for us to practice and get ready for the first home game,” Randle said.

“Me and Joey have been in this position before, my last year here we lost by 70? Whatever. We won’t be this team.

“We know exactly what went on, they (Sydney) played a tremendous game and we played like shit and we know what we have to do and from this point on will give a way better effort.

“There is a lot of potential and we went on a run and cut the lead down, but if we came out with that energy from the get-go then the game would have been totally different so we have to hold each other accountable.”