Basketball: Tall Blacks to keep Boomers guessing

The Boomers and Tall Blacks each have two wins from two in the four-way tournament in Australia but one must crash tonight in a game both have approached nervously because of the world qualifying series ahead.

The early games in Perth have been 5000-seat sell-outs and a big crowd is expected at the Sydney Entertainment Centre for the transtasman clash.

The Tall Blacks have gathered momentum, still have plays they haven't shown and have yet to produce their best, says coach Tab Baldwin, who admits to uncertainty over his approach to the game that will decide the tournament.

"It's Australia, so it's important. But we'll see. Everybody in New Zealand knows what it's like to play Australia and we'll be feeling that on Friday night."

The Boomers beat China 89-50 and Lithuania 71-66. New Zealand beat China 90-70 so after four games in Perth their points differential is just seven behind the Australians.

Baldwin has to be happy with the results so far. The team had a slow start against Lithuania before running the opposition down 79-62.

"When you finish stronger, you are happier," said Baldwin. "We still had periods where we didn't play our best basketball."

The coaching staff might have helped more by reacting more quickly to Lithuania's game plan, he said.

"They're tactically very clever, their players are skilled and defensively, they're very unorthodox. It took a little time to figure out what they were running and in the end we decided to run just one thing and stick with it.

"Defensively, our guards ... did a tremendous job pressuring their counterparts and ground them down."

The Tall Blacks trailed by seven points in the opening quarter and took almost three-quarters of the game to impose themselves on the Europeans.

"Our offence wasn't what it should be, but that was because of their defence," said Dillon Boucher.

"We just kept attacking them and slowly wore them down."

The Tall Blacks took a 23-20 lead early in the second period as Ed Book, Kirk Penney and Aaron Olson scored three-pointers. But Lithuanian centre Pavelas Cukinas dominated in the latter stages and finished with 11 points for the quarter. His team led 37-34 at halftime.

Pero Cameron scored eight of the Tall Blacks' final 10 points of the half, including two three-pointers, to keep them in touch.

After the restart, Jones found his range to spark an 11-2 run for a 58-55 margin at the final break. By the end he led all scorers with 19 points, shooting 4/5 field goals, 2/2 three-pointers, 4/4 free-throws.

Cameron had 15 points, six rebounds and four assists, while Boucher finished with nine points, five assists, four rebounds and two steals, and will have impressed the hometown fans of his new NBL team, the Perth Wildcats.

It seems sure that point guard Mark Dickel will play a bigger part from here on, after his late arrival in camp. He was on for 18 minutes against China then 14 against Lithuania but his greater experience and fast, bumping game may suit the contest against the Boomers.

It's unlikely the Tall Blacks will veer way from the physical style that has brought them two wins. The Aussies will be expecting it.

The Boomers' best have been David Andersen, Glen Saville and Jason Smith. Coach Brian Goorjian has been testing his squad and re-adjusting the line-up against the under-strength Chinese and Lithuanian outfits, but that will not be the case tonight.

Both teams will be keen to gain psychological advantage ahead of the three-game Oceania series in Auckland and Dunedin next week, which decides seedings for the world championships in Japan next year.