Wildcats down Saints to bring up perfect 10
Warwick has landed another psychological blow on Saints ahead of the Heathley Big Q League playoffs, taking a 106-100 win at home in the final round of the regular season to secure a perfect 10-0 record.
After last week’s three-point defeat ensured they would take home the minor premiership, the Wildcats again were too strong for their Toowoomba rivals, who they will again match-up with in Saturday’s grand final qualifier.
With inside force James Kuon missing, it was again James Legan that led from the front, finishing with a season-high 46 points, while Kobe Robinson chipped in with 25.
For the Saints, former Mountaineers veteran Glenn Reimann showed he is not a player to be left unguarded in the play-offs, producing a team-high 28 points.
Warwick assistant coach Jeff Clark said while the team was confident they could match-up with the remaining teams in the competition, they weren’t counting themselves over the line in Saturday’s play-off fixture.
“Every game is a new game and although we believe we have a team to beat them, last night they were missing Steve Kluck and Jason Ebneter who are two quality players,” Clark said.
“We were missing our QBL centre James Kuon which puts us both around even again.
“In both games we’ve beaten them by three and six points, and you never feel comfortable against any team like that.” The Wildcats started strongly to lead by as much as 13 points in the opening term, but a Saints fightback saw the visitors hold a seven-point advantage at the half.
Warwick clicked into gear in the third as they took a doubledigit lead into the final term and were able to hold their rivals at bay throughout the fourth.
Clark said the team was able to take confidence from the fact they haven’t tasted defeat throughout the season.
“It doesn’t matter how we’ve played in these games, what matters is how we play on Saturday night,” he said.
“It’s good to know we’ve beaten the teams in the competition twice, but we know they can match-up, so we have to remain composed.
“We want to win on Saturday to go straight through to the grand final and not take the risk. We’ve only just beaten the other top-seed teams and there are no easy games.”