Beaten Flames to face truth
THE Townsville Flames’ perfect start to the QBL season has come crashing down with a 96- 67 loss to defending champions the Southern District Spartans on Saturday night.
The Flames fell behind 19- 2 in the opening quarter and they never recovered as Spartans import Ambrosia Anderson ( 24 points, 3 rebounds, 3 assists) inspired her team to a big victory.
It was a better night for the Townsville Heat as they held off a late comeback to beat the Spartans 80- 73, with Harry Froling ( 20 points, 7 rebounds) leading the way in their seventh win in a row.
The Heat opened up a 25- 13 lead at quarter- time, but the Spartans kept fighting and had it back to a twopossession game in the final term before the home side closed it out.
But Townsville’s women’s team struggled to match the physicality of their rivals in a performance which coach Mike St- Maurice described as a blow to their championship credentials.
“This would just be blood in the water for other teams to see us lose by this much and give them confidence,” St- Maurice said.
“We knew the Spartans were good, but they just did such a good job of taking us out of everything that we wanted to do.
“They didn’t play like a team that had played a full game ( in Cairns on Friday night) and then travelled four hours.
“They were two steps ahead of us the whole way.
“We just never found any combination that we were able to sustain a couple of stops. I certainly don’t mind losing, but the way in which we lost was really demoralising.”
Townsville was more competitive in the second half as Micaela Cocks ( 15 points, 6 rebounds) led the scoring for her side, but StMaurice said their poor starts had been an ongoing issue.
The Flames face a tough road double- header against Logan and the unbeaten Ipswich this weekend and the coach said it was important they take everything on board in tonight’s video review.
“We had that triple- header and our inability to really stop people in the first quarter was something that we’d looked at and spoken about, but we really hadn’t done anything about it,” St- Maurice said.
“We just ended up sorting things out because by the end of the first quarter in each of those games we were still in the contest, but the Spartans didn’t allow us to do that.
“We’ll watch the video and it’s the brutal, honest truth. Video doesn’t lie.
“We’ll probably have a long session ( tonight) and look to rebuild from there. Hopefully positive things come out of this.”