Sixers push Wildcats in final home game

The Adelaide 36ers responded to Friday night and fought hard in the final home game of the season in front of another big Adelaide Entertainment Centre crowd, but couldn’t quite topple the finals bound Perth Wildcats.

This weekend marked the last two home games of the season for the 36ers and Friday night against the Illawarra Hawks wasn’t one anyone would want to remember fondly.

But the support from the Sixers fans has been brilliant all season long and it was another packed Entertainment Centre on Sunday afternoon with 6422 in attendance as the 36ers hosted the hold foes, the Wildcats.

The effort was certainly a vastly improved one from the 36ers as well and there were some brief moments late in the game where Brandon Paul threatened to shoot them to a second home win over Perth this season, but it wasn’t quite to be with the 'Cats holding on to win 76-68.

It's a Wildcats team heading towards the playoffs and they did arrive in Adelaide minus superstar Bryce Cotton, but that's offset with the 36ers now without point guard Josh Giddey and centre Isaac Humphries for the rest of the #NBL21 season.

Adelaide fought hard the entire afternoon with the home fans willing them on and there was never more than nine points between the two old rivals the entire game, but the Sixers just couldn’t quite get over that hump down the stretch.

Daniel Johnson once again top-scored for the Sixers with 13 points and seven rebounds with Tony Crocker putting up 12 points to go with five assists, four rebounds and three steals.

Daniel Dillon had his second straight strong showing running the point with 11 points and five assists while Brandon Paul had 10 points, 11 rebounds and four assists, Jack McVeigh 10 points and three boards, Sunday Dech eight points and Keanu Pinder four points and five rebounds.

Adelaide coach Conner Henry wasn’t concerned with the fact that his team took 33 attempts from downtown and more often than not with those looks, they will end up hitting more than eight of them.

In the end, though, it was losing the rebound battle by 12 and giving up 188 offensive rebounds for 165 second chance points from Perth that he was most frustrated by.

The depleted Adelaide side was guilty of trying to blast its way out of trouble with 33 shots from outside, but coach Conner Henry said it was their effort on the boards that cost them.

"The way the roster is right now, we're pretty much a jump shooting team," he said.

"We took a lot of threes and made a few, not a high number of course. We need to make some shots from the outside and try to get on the rim.

"It comes down to a possession game, it's been that way all year long. We had 59 field goal attempts, they had 70. They had 18 offensive rebounds and we had 14 turnovers.

"Some of it was decision making, some of it was just putting it all together. Tonight I thought was better than our last game and we did some nice things, we just couldn't get over the hump."

The Sixers now hit the road to start their end to the season against the New Zealand Breakers in Christchurch on Tuesday.

HUNGRY JACK'S NBL ROUND 19

ADELAIDE 36ERS 68 (Johnson 13, Crocker 12, Dillon 11)

PERTH WILDCATS 76 (Norton 19, Mooney 15, Blanchfield 14) 

BOX SCORE