Sharks fight off Taranaki to post victory

The Southland Sharks survived an 11-point comeback from the Taranaki Mountain Airs to claim an 86-82 National Basketball League win in New Plymouth last night.

The Southland side got off to a slow start, turning the ball over in each of its first two possessions, with the home side capitalising to get out to an early five-point lead.

It didn’t take long for the visitors to get going, however, with both Alex Pledger and Everard Bartlett finding their strokes.

While the Mountain Airs would have been fairly happy letting Pledger settle for a long two, he was able to make the most of the space given to him and scored eight in the first period sinking each of his first four shots.

The visitors shot a shade over 45 per cent from the three-point line on their way to a 21-point win in Nelson the previous night and looked to repeat the dose against Taranaki.

Shots were falling for the Mountain Airs early before turnovers halted their momentum.

Twice in the period they were unable to get the ball out of their own half in the allotted time in the first quarter, struggling to deal with Southland’s double-teams.

The second period saw the Taranaki side try to work the ball into the paint, with Daniel Miller taking on Pledger in the post a number of times.

Though the shots weren’t falling they weren’t settling for low percentage jumpers.

However at the other end the Southland side were dropping daggers from beyond the arc, shooting at 50 per cent from deep and 54 per cent from the floor in the half.

The Mountain Airs were holding their own though, shooting a respectable 47 per cent from the floor themselves, however the five extra made three pointers gave Southland the buffer as they went into the break ahead 52-41.

Taranaki captain Aaron BaileyNowell flashed his range for a rare long ball as his side went on an 8-0 run to begin the second half.

Mountain Airs swingman Marcus Johnson had the hot hand and sank shot after shot as the Tara- naki team found themselves in the lead midway through the third quarter.

In a compete turnaround from the first half, shots just wouldn’t fall for the visitors as they found themselves on the wrong side of a 19-5 run.

With the scores locked at 67, both sides had everything to play for when the fourth quarter began.

After sinking three of his first four shots from deep, Bartlett went ice cold for the Sharks and missed his next seven as the team struggled to find good looks.

However, his side was able to grind out a win in the final minutes.