Wells laments Sixers' inability to find rhythm against Phoenix

Adelaide 36ers Head Coach Mike Wells says his side did not deal well with South East Melbourne’s pace and physicality in Sunday’s HoopsFest loss in Western Australia.

Bryce Cotton scored a game-high 30 points to go with two rebounds and six assists but the Sixers were beaten in every quarter, eventually succumbing 108-89 at Perth’s RAC Arena.

A forthright Wells gave credit to the Phoenix for the way they controlled the contest and never let his side build any momentum.

“In the third where we got it to seven (points), and then it went back to nine,” he said. “We got to seven, it went to 12.

“It was eight, you know, we never could break that barrier to really put gain pressure back on them.”

“The pressure kind of sped us up,” Wells added. “Pressure is designed to make players turn inward, and you want to go kind of one-on-one, and unfortunately, when you go one-on one and you get your head down and you don't see the decisions that you need to see quick enough, right? You've got to be able to have vision of the floor.

“I thought, you know, give them credit because their pace and their physicality and stuff, you know, the game was played at their pace.”

Even though it was an 11:30am tip-off, it was a good start for the Sixers who burst out of the blocks to lead 9-2 early. But as they always do, the Phoenix came back hard, scoring the next 16 points as the Sixers struggled on the offensive end.

In his first minutes in Sixers colours, new signing John Jenkins ended the run, hitting a three-pointer that seemed to spark the side into action.

But even with Isaac White, in the starting five, racking up eight first-quarter points, the Phoenix took an eight-point lead into the first break, showing they can still score plenty without their star man Nathan Sobey missing through illness.

The Adelaide side closed the gap momentarily as Cotton went to work, racing to 16 first half points to lead all scorers, but despite all his efforts, the Phoenix extended their advantage to 10 points at the main break.

The biggest difference to that point of the match was the teams’ respective success from beyond the arc with the Phoenix 6/16 to the Sixers just 2/13.

That stat didn’t improve in the third period, in fact it slipped to 3/17 as the Phoenix pulled further ahead on the scoreboard, with all of their starters ticking into double figures for scoring.

The Sixers on the other hand were struggling for any offensive rhythm and were often beaten on the offensive boards, giving their opponents too many opportunities to score.

The margin crept up to 25 points and while there was some late scoring to bring it back down below 20, it was just not the Sixers’ day.

The loss doesn’t impact the Sixers’ standing at the top of the Hungry Jack’s NBL ladder but means the Phoenix close to within two games.

Wells said he was not so much concerned with ladder position but the side’s failure to find any rhythm.

“We've had a really good year,” he said. “We've done a lot of really good things.

“(It’s kind of been) cruise along and then all of a sudden we have a two-game losing streak right now.

“I think that's more of the concern is the rhythm and the pace of our team.

“We obviously want to play well. I think we're pretty healthy. We've had an interesting week with time off and a new player coming in and adjusting and stuff like that.

“But you know, this was one 33rd of our season, and I'm not going to go overboard and say that this was a really big game, right? Would it have been nice to play better, would it have been nice to win? Absolutely.

“The win is validation for whether you're playing well or not really, for a lot of people.

“I'm looking at a lot of different things. We certainly didn't play the Adelaide 36er basketball I wanted to today.”

Sunday’s game was the start of a tricky run of away fixtures for the Sixers who next travel to Auckland to face New Zealand on Friday evening, before flying to Sydney to meet the Kings and then the Gold Coast to meet the Brisbane Bullets.