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Shock horror as Australia fails to reach final despite the preposterous advantage of home court for the entire competition...

Shock horror OTT9 talks alot and achieves nothing. ;)

We rolled the dice and fell short. Our side beat a lot of sides with better rosters and fell 1 stop short of being our equal best 21 NT side ever. Now to build the side for next season World Cup.
Climbing from 44 to 21 in world rankings is a decent season. Would of liked to of won tonight but our key players were not in great gameshape and we did not have the depth to cover them well.

Thanks to all for your input this season and lets make a real run next season.

Shock horror as Australia fails to reach final despite the preposterous advantage of home court for the entire competition...

Fantastic effort by the Aussies who were at the start of the season, not considered by our own as being a team capable of making the semis, because of a lack of quality talls.

Ted and Wayne have led the talls all season magnificantly.

Really poor form of yours OTT9 to be celebrating our lose and carrying on like you have been.

Great effort of yours over the season Mickyster.

Long live the King

Last edited by Sid Vicious at 9/13/2013 6:12:50 AM

Thanks Sid
I disappointed with tonight's result but happy with making the semis and getting a new trophy for our team.
Looking forward to next season.

Sid I'm just saying that our Season 23 squad managed to win us HCA for this competition and we had every other team right where we wanted them! And then we let them off the hook! So frustrating!

To be frank, we really didn't have that great a team this season. It was a solid team, but not great.

We'll be better next season, so hopefully we make it through the repa.

The core of the 20 year olds could give the 21 year olds a run for their money IMO

I think the team performed to its full potential. we got beaten by a better side tonight, well done to Mickystar for playing Motion, not really sure what lineup you picked, but the minute distribution seemed a bit odd, but well done regardless for trying everything to get the right mix

dare i say it though, FT's .. 18 from 35. thats only just above 50%

the team shot pretty poorly most season, which means most of the guys have poor FT. which, in an U21 situation, what do you do? Very tough to see this happening, but at the same time, to know that that could have been the difference, means we were competitive everywhere else.

Match Report Australia V Pilipinas
Semi Final of Asian Championship (13/9/13)


Final Score Australia 72 defeated by the Pilipinas 84

Nickname legend

Chung Trieu = The Truth
Poluta'u Brar = Polar Bear
Claude Goolagong = Evonnes Son
Andrew Garachico = Chico Roll
Brad Baldyga = Bald Guy
Roosevelt Feaunati = Ted
Michael Wayne = The Duke
Shane Goodes = Goodsy
Albert Sacks = Hessian Bag
Will Williams = Tic Tac
Burl Barth = Bath Water
Sercombe =Combover
Wang =Wang Chung
Sapwell = Sappy
Wombat King = Mickyster



After a 2 and a half hour bus trip from Melbourne to the Country Victorian town of Heywood, the Aussie Under 21s warmed up at the legendary 23,800 seat Arena of the mighty 4th Division team the Heywood Big Dogs.

With another 1200 seats under construction the Kennel as it is affectionately known is one of the biggest stadiums in Aussie Buzzerbeater.

The gallant Aussies who had been maligned and written off pre-season because of their lack of talls, had made it all the way through to tonights Asian Championships semi final against the 8th ranked Pilipina team by compiling some impressive victories against much higher ranked nations and in doing so had climbed from a world ranking of 41 up to 21st

Knowing that a win tonight would take them directly into the main draw for next seasons World U21 cup, much though and pre match discussion had gone into what strategies and line up to put on court.

With training having to occur just before the tip off of the game, a few of the key players were down on gameshape most notably The Duke who despite a strong gameshape, had had his DMI nearly halved from the previous weeks game, and so the decision was made to play a motion offence perhaps in the anticipation that the Pilipinas would play a 2 3 zone as they had done so in all their previous big games.

First hand on the ball for the game was the Dukes who tapped it down to Wang Chung who missed the layup, but a couple of minutes later put the first score on the board when he sunk one of two free throws, the Pilipinas big man Vescathco quickly put his team back in the lead before Ted scored a layup to put the Aussies back in front.

As the quarter progressed it became obvious that the venue, The Kennel, was quite fitting as this game had become a real Dog Fight and 9 minutes in, the scores were 8 all with the Aussies having missed 7 of 9 field goal attempts and only hit 4 of 10 free throws.
The last 2 and a half minutes of the 1st quarter saw the Aussies get out to a nice 6 point lead with Tic Tac hitting 2 of 3, 3 point attempts, Wang Chung getting a lay up, before the Pilipinas closed to within 2 points at quarter time with 2 late baskets making the score 16 to 14 Australias way.

Within 5 seconds of the start of the 2nd quarter, Wayne had been called for his 3rd foul and panic was starting to enter into the Aussies camp, 19 to 10 down on rebounds how would the Aussies fare if the Duke was to foul out?

Luckily Tic Tac was finally in a mind to play basketball to his true potential being defensively sound against both Porter (44K centre) and Cantara (30K SF), whilst continuing to hit points himself and when The Duke found his range first with a 2 pointer, then a 3 and then some free throws followed by a dunk, the Aussies had snuck out to a 9 point lead with 5 minutes left in the 2nd , which could have been 11 points if the Hessian Bag had of hit 2 free throws.

As a good team does the Pilipinas regrouped after a time out and closed the gap back to 6 points before Wang Chung, Ted and then Bath Water missed shots.

A late goal to the Pilipinas saw them close to within 4 points, 33 to 29 at half time in a low scoring game.


Continued in the next post

Last edited by Sid Vicious at 9/14/2013 10:17:03 PM

Continued from the previous post

The mood in the Aussie Chat room was extremely positive, if we could keep the Duke on the court, the masterstroke of playing motion, might just get the Aussies the win and into next seasons World Cup

Half a minute into the 3rd and catastrophe, the Duke got called for his 5th foul and Vescathco hit the 2 free throws, but Tic Tac quickly restored the 4 point buffer with a fadeaway.

The clash between the underdone underage in foul trouble Duke and Vescathco was looking pivitol to the contest but it was a couple of fouls from the Hessian Bag, which allowed the Pilipinas to hit the lead courtesy of free throws, 5 minutes into the 3rd.

Serana (12 rebounds, 16 points) and Vescathco (14 rebounds and 17 points) were becoming dominant as the 3rd quarter progressed and within a space of 5 minutes the Pilipinas had stretched their lead to 12 points, before a last minute 3 from Tic Tac and a jumper from Bath Water closed the gap to 8 points at 3 quarter time. Aussies down 49 to 57

The 4th quarter started with the Duke drawing a 4th foul on Vescathco and then sinking the 2 free throws to reduce the margin to 6 points.

Got to be said that the Aussie coach seemed a little bit hyperactive with all the positional moves in the 4th and it was difficult to tell whether this confused the Pilipinas as much as it unbalanced the Aussies.

Ted certainly lifted and was grabbing boards from everywhere in the last and a Bath Water lay up 6 minutes into the last brought the margin back to 3 points, before the Pilipinas steadied with 2 quick baskets

The Hessian Bag was everywhere with a baseline jumper, free throws and a 3 pointer all dropping, and the Aussies were within 2 points, before the Pilipinas again steadied to have a 5 point lead with 2 and a half minutes left.

Free throws to Guieb were quickly offset by a 2 pointer from Bath Water and with 90 seconds left the margin was 4 points.

In the last minute the Pilipinas hit their free throws and we missed ours and tension in the chat room got a bit out of hand with one Northern Neighbour seeking to rub our collective Aussie noses in our impending elimination.

Final margin being a 12 point loss, 72 to 84.

The Aussies based on match ratings had won the SG, SF and PF positions but had hit only 18 of 35 free throw attempts as compared to our opponents 28 from 34.

Sadly the Pilipinas played a man on man defence rather than their expected 2 3 zone.

Tic Tac ranked a 15 at SF, Ted did splendidly with a 16 ranking at PF and the Duke showed a lot of maturity to play out the game with 5 fouls and despite a solid showing (15.5 rating) he was beaten by Vescathco on the night who ranked 17.

Evonnes Son 4 assists and a game rating of 15 was solid as was the Bald Guy with a 15.5 and the 20yo Sappy also had a good game with a 15 rating

A valiant loss but also a game of could have beens.

If we’d been better from the free throw line?
If the Duke had of had better game shape?
If our gaurds had given off more assists?
If the coach had of left Tic Tac and the Duke on longer in the last?
What if I hadnt of suggested motion?
If we’d played IS instead of motion?
If Tic Tac had given up the beer as well as the spirits?

We’ll never know the answer to all these questions but we all should be proud of the players and the Managers who were all part of the U21s season 24 team.

Long live the Wombat King



Last edited by Sid Vicious at 9/13/2013 6:33:51 PM

Sorry for the earlier outbursts guys, just had to blow off steam over the loss on our home court. I'm sure you did the best you could with the players you had Mickyster. Here's to hoping our next few player pools are stronger...