Johnson: Eagles don’t know how to stop rivals
We just took our foot off the gas, particularly at the defensive end, and
mistakes just snowballed. That’s something we’ve done
all season long
‘SNOWBALLING mistakes’ and a lack of defensive intensity again cost the Newcastle Eagles in their home defeat to the Plymouth City Patriots.
That is the view of despondent Eagles ace Corey Johnson after Friday night’s 91-87 loss at the Vertu Motors Arena. The disappointing result means the BBL’S most successful franchise has now lost nine of its 17 league games in what has been a frustrating season.
It could have been an entirely different story, however, as the Eagles contrived to hit the self-destruct button, surrendering a 15-point third-quarter lead.
Instead, the visitors rallied in the final 10 minutes and ended Newcastle’s three-match winning run.
“It was definitely a tough one. The better team showed up so all credit to them,” Johnson said.
“They’re a good team and they executed well especially in the second half to get back in the game.”
Friday’s collapse was not the first the Eagles have suffered this season, with big leads whittled away by other opponents in recent months.
And Johnson admitted the team still struggles to cope when momentum swings away from them.
“I think we just took our foot off the gas, particularly at the defensive end, and mistakes just snowballed,” he added.
“That’s something we’ve done all season long and we’re yet to learn how to stop teams when they get on a run before letting it happen and that’s on us as a defensive unit.
“We’ve just got to get back to work next week and learn from this. I’m not too worried as there are still a lot of games left so we’ve just got to keep moving forward.”
Head coach Ian Macleod also made his frustrations clear after the game, saying his team’s results are far short of what he expects.
After completing a BBL Cup and BBL Playoffs double last season, it looks like the Eagles could end this campaign without any silverware unless something drastically changes.
Macleod said: “I think second half we didn’t adjust. They came up with some solutions in the second half and we didn’t execute our solutions and I think that was the story of the game.
“It’s our ninth loss in the league and that’s simply not good enough.
“It all starts with our defence and it’s not good enough to play two quarters of defence, we have to play four and that’s what we need to build on.
“We were waiting for the win to come as opposed to taking the game by the scruff of the neck.
“We were up by 15 in the third and the foundation had been built but we broke what we’d built. They just made more plays in the second half and we didn’t.
“There are lots of things you can look at but we made the most mistakes in the game and that’s what cost us.”
Defensive lapses have been a recurring problem for the Eagles this season but Plymouth’s turnaround since the turn of the year has been spectacular, winning eight of their 11 games in 2022.
“They got on a roll and are playing with nothing to lose as they were sort of written off,” Johnson added.
“You can see now they’re together on the court and they play a scrappy style of basketball and were able to disrupt our rhythm a lot which lead to them laying the foundation for the win.”
“We have to make sure going forward that we don’t take our foot off the gas defensively as I said.
“Our defence sets the tone for us on both ends.
“If we play defence well usually things work out for us on the offensive end and we didn’t carry that over too much enough tonight.”
The Eagles are next in action on Friday ahe Vertu Motors Arena when Manchester Giants come to town in a game that will be broadcast live in front of the Sky Sports cameras.