Charity shirts to fire Heat, Flames

TOWNSVILLE’S QBL teams are hoping their special one- off jerseys to raise money for Act for Kids will serve as good luck charms for their must- win clashes with Mackay tonight.

The Heat will don the allblue strip for their face- off with a red hot Mackay Meteors at Townsville Basketball Stadium, with a loss killing their slim hopes at a finals berth.

Mackay come into tonight’s clash with plenty of momentum after dropping just one of their 14 games this season, but Heat coach Rodney Anderson said his team was up for the challenge of taking on the starstudded team that includes former Townsville Crocodiles point guard Chris Cedar.

“They’ve only lost one game this year but our team is really looking forward to the challenge and we are all really up for this game,” he said.

“They have some really good guards in Cedar and Braydon Hobbs, their import, who are really good at getting to the basket, so we need to contain them and really try and go inside to our big guys.

“We have only lost one game at home so we don’t feel like underdogs in this game and it’s going to be a challenge for them to come in here and try and upset us.”

The Flames will also face a tall task in trying to knock off a Mackay Meteorettes side that have dominated the QBL in recent years on their way to the past three titles.

Mackay- born Flames forward Jacqui Zelenka knows their strengths well after spending a number of years with the Meteorettes program and the WNBL up- and- comer is looking forward to trying to undo her old team.

“It’s going to be tough but we need to focus on what we do and when we went down there ( earlier this season) we had a really good offensive game in the first half and got our stops defensively,” Zelenka said.