Kings-slayer Gaze gives his side a dressing down
UNDER-SIEGE Sydney coach Andrew Gaze has brutally branded the Kings the worst team in the NBL and described their plight as “scary”.
Gaze delivered an old-fashioned, paint-stripping postmatch spray at his team, shortly after their humiliating 114-84 loss to the Adelaide 36ers on Saturday night – two days after New Zealand thumped the Kings by 17 points in Auckland.
“In this early stage, I think there are three clearly really dominant teams (Perth, Melbourne and Adelaide), the rest are very good and then there’s us,” said second-year mentor Gaze. “That’s how the rankings are right now.
“It’s a scary proposition because there are some issues there that you can’t fix quickly.
“There are a lot of elements to it that you look at and say we’re well below being able to compare with the better teams.” Gaze – the greatest player in NBL history after scoring a re- cord 18,909 points across 612 games with the Melbourne Tigers from 1984-2005 – has found coaching tougher, his team’s plight compounded with Kevin Lisch (torn calf) sidelined for two months, robbing the Kings of their captain, floor general and a dual NBL MVP.
Gaze knows club management will make any decision they deem necessary – on him or the roster – but the five-time Olympian believes any shortterm improvement will have to come organically rather than by making wholesale changes.
“Through my experiences as a player and going through these very tough times, there is no simple wand, unless we bring in four new players – and we’re not going to do that.
“Hopefully we’ve got some evidence now that the players don’t see this as an aberration, they see it as an area in need of urgent attention.”
IT’S A SCARY PROPOSITION BECAUSE THERE ARE SOME ISSUES THERE THAT YOU CAN’T FIX QUICKLY. ANDREW GAZE