Basketball: Boomers take first blood in seeding battle

Australia 82 New Zealand 69

The Australians took psychological advantage in the fight for a top seeding at the 2006 world basketball championships with a win in the first of the three-test Oceania Series at the Trusts Stadium in Henderson last night.

The Boomers enjoyed a height advantage and exploited it against an enthusiastic home side but it was execution at the basket that cost the Tall Blacks, especially early on.

A run of 20 unanswered points in the second period took the game away from the Tall Blacks.

They opened the scoring with a three from Phill Jones but missed their next four opportunities at the basket until Jones nailed a second shot from beyond the arc after nearly five minutes. But their rebounding at both ends was good and the Boomers called the first time-out after Dillon Boucher drove to the basket to make it 8-7 to the home team.

CJ Bruton and Kirk Penney traded three pointers, Jones produced a nice back lay-up, Boomers forwards Matt Neilsen and David Andersen used their height advantage to score inside and the first period finished with the visitors up 17-15.

The Tall Blacks could have led, had they nailed their early chances. It was a cold start, but not slow.

In the second quarter they were out-played, Craig Bradshaw opening with a dunk but then the Boomers going on a 20-point run to lead 37-17, with Neilsen and Andersen piling on the points.

The Tall Blacks continued to miss their shots. With three minutes left coach Tab Baldwin called the second time-out of the period and from there they adjusted, sparked and produced energetic rebounding that helped them close to 42-31 at halftime.

Penney missed shots he would normally have sunk, perhaps due to the back injury he suffered two days ago but he and Jones were smothered defensively.

So were Bruton and Jason Smith but all still managed to get long-range shots off. A total of 45 of the points came from beyond the arc.

The Aussies were doing better inside, though, and their execution was 56 per cent to the Tall Blacks' 36.

The only surprise was the low foul count but that was down to lenient - and balanced - refereeing rather than any lack of intensity.

The Tall Blacks stepped up their defence in the third period and as the Boomers tired their shot percentage dropped, Pero Cameron leading the home team with a lift in energy and drives to the basket that produced a run of points.

But then Tony Rampton started to get in foul trouble and while he was off Andersen used that height differential over the rest to his advantage with blocks and intercepts and the third quarter ended 58-51 to the Aussies.

Their coach Brian Goorjian still had four unused players on the bench. Bruton played nearly the whole game, led the scoring and led them home.

Neither team was able to dominate in the home stretch, the gap maintained at around 10 points.

New Zealand's job ahead of game two at the Manukau Events Centre on Saturday is to focus on playing the full 40 minutes.

The third match in the series is in Dunedin on Sunday.

Australia 82 (CJ Bruton 25, D. Andersen 14, G. Saville 12)

New Zealand 69 (A. Olson 14, M. Dickel 13, P. Cameron 13, P. Jones 11).

HT: 42-31.