Sixers ‘mix it up’ to try and stay fresh for NBL showdown in NZ after prolonged break in the schedule

IT has been one of the biggest challenges of Joey Wright’s coaching career and until Friday’s NBL road game to New Zealand, he won’t know if he’s succeeded.

NBL Round 10 match between the Townsville Crocodiles and the Adelaide 36ers at 'The Swamp'. 36ers Mitchell Creek goes up against Crocodiles Clint Steindl. Picture: Wesley Monts

IT has been one of the biggest challenges of Joey Wright’s coaching career and until Friday’s NBL road game to New Zealand, he won’t know if he’s succeeded.

The challenge, of course, is to have his Adelaide 36ers playing finals-type basketball at a time when they have not played a game in 16 days and only one in the preceding 11 days.

Effectively, Friday’s visit to Auckland’s North Shore Events Centre to face the might of the reigning champion Breakers will be Adelaide’s second game in 27 days.

“I haven’t ever seen anything like this before,” Wright said last night.

“I never saw anything like this as a player and this is the first time I’ve seen this as a coach.”

Adelaide hosted and beat Townsville 76-66 on December 12, then 11 days later on December 23, knocked off Melbourne 91-81.

That was ahead of this 16-day break.

“We were OK in that Melbourne game,” Wright said.

“The stuff we didn’t do well wasn’t as a result of our lay-off.

“But I’m not sure what will happen in (a break of) 16 days.”

There have been positives for the 36ers, with Mitch Creek, who missed the United game after appendix surgery, back on court and the players enjoying two rare training breaks.

“We took two days off at Christmas and two days off at New Year’s,” Wright said.

“The guys got to spend some time with their families, which doesn’t usually happen.

“They came back ready to go too. There was no lethargy.

“We told them not to come back sluggish and they didn’t.”

While Adelaide has been idle, New Zealand has beaten Sydney Kings and lost on the road to Cairns Taipans.

“We’ve tried a number of different things - we played dodgeball today,” Wright said of keeping his players engaged.

“We’ve tried to create some atmosphere with game-like situations.

“In a normal day’s training we might have an area specified for shooting, for offence, for working on defence but in this situation, we were able to spend whole training sessions on a specific, such as our press.

“You can really iron some issues out when you only have one focus.”

Did it work?

The answer will be clearer on Friday.

Originally published as Sixers ‘mix it up’ to try and stay fresh for NBL showdown in NZ after prolonged break in the schedule