Hawks’ two from two on Easter road trip

Hawks Jordan Hunt pushing hard in a match played last year. Photo NZME

It was time for capital gains as the Taylor Hawks completed a magic Easter road-trip national men’s basketball league start with a 14-points hammering of Wellington Saints on Saturday.

With former Saints player and off-season signing Jordan Ngatai scoring 30 points, the Hawks won 88-74 at the TSB Arena in Wellington, just 48 hours after opening the 2023 Sal’s NBL season with an 84-79 win over Franklin Bulls in Pukekohe on Thursday night.

The Hawks’ win, only the second over the Saints in the clubs’ last 14 match-ups, guaranteed a big start to the home schedule with a Saturday 7pm game against at Pettigrew.Green Arena, Taradale, next weekend against Taranaki Airs, who exited the 2022 competition in the semi-finals after finishing top of the table in the regular season.

The Saints won by 30pts and 27pts in the clubs’ 2022 matches last July last year in Wellington, the Saints beat the Hawke’s 77-75 in the 2021final, and the last time the Hawks won in their usually annual home and away matches was earlier that season at the PGA.

On Saturday night, the Hawks led 25-21 at the end of the first quarter and 43-38 at halftime, but conceding 14 points unanswered in the 4th to 6th minutes of the third went from 51-43 up (the widest margin at that stage) to 51-57 down, and were still down 63-64 going into the last 10.

They re-hit the lead within 30 seconds with a Ngatai three-point turn around jump shot, and were never again headed, and banged it home with six points in the last minute - two points from a Jordan Hunt dunk and free-throw doubles from club stalwart and new general manager Jarrod Kenny and then Ngatai with 35 seconds to go.

Ngatai had 38min 19sec on court for his 30pts, with included two three-pointers and 8 of 10 from the free-throw line, Derome Raukawa had 18min 25sec for his 17pts, and Hunt 35min 55sec for 16pts, while Ethan Rusbatch who scored 29pts on court for more than 40 minutes in Thursday’s overtime win over the Bulls again served a busy duty in the capital, with 12pts in 36min 43sec on court.

Taane Samuel topped the tallies for the Saints with 19pts, while Rangimarie Dougall-Mita scored 12 entirely comprising three-pointers.