Keep believing Wollongong, those indestructible Hawks are still right in the hunt for an NBL title.Last night the Hawks shrugged off an ordinary first half to overpower the Perth Wildcats by 12 points in a brutal grand final series duel at WIN Entertainment Centre.Down by a point at half-time after failing to cope with the Wildcats’ no-holds-barred basketball, Wollongongregained composure in the second half to tie the best-of-three series at 1-1.The deciding third game will be hosted by the Wildcats on Friday night.
PIC GALLERY: All the action from WIN Entertainment CentreWollongong will be gunning for the club’s second title in its 32-year existence.Man of the hour for the Hawks was forward Cam Tragardh (28 points, 12/19 field goals), while experiencedback-up guard Luke Martin (11 points, four assists) rose to the occasion.Starting playmaker Rhys Martin tallied 10 points, four rebounds and three assists and centre Larry Davidson had a huge second half to finish with eight points and eight rebounds.‘‘We wanted to set the platform in the first half and get physical, and by the end of it, that really helped usrun over the top of them,’’ Davidson said.‘‘I wasn’t ready for the season to finish tonight.‘‘No-one will give us any chance over there, but it’s been like that all year and we don’t care what other people think.’’Tragardh revealed he was on a mission to make up for a quiet performance in game one.‘‘I was a bit of a no-show in game one and I really wanted to bounce back,’’ he said. ‘‘This win means a lot to these people and it means a lot to me.‘‘Defensively we were fantastic in the first half and (coach) Gordie (McLeod) said we were right where we wanted to be.‘‘We think we’re fitter than them and the longer the series goes, the better chance we have.‘‘We’ll go over to Perth and roll the dice and we can’t wait.’’It took 98 seconds before the first stand-off occurred, with Davidson and Cats captain Shawn Redhage exchanging shoves.Tragardh scored the Hawks’ first six points, but Perth went on a 7-0 run to lead 12-6. The Cats did a good job of taking away their opponents’ transition offence and were finding holes in Wollongong’s defence at the other end.The Hawks fell behind by seven before fighting back to trail 20-16 at quarter-time.McLeod used his first time-out with his team down 25-21 four minutes into the second period.Wollongong’s first three-pointer didn’t come until back-up guard Luke Martin knocked one down from long range with five minutes left in the first half. But every time the home side pulled to within a point, theCats kept knocking down crucial baskets.Wollongong struggled to get anything going at the offensive end and did well to only be down 33-32 at themain break. But the Hawks had all the adjustments to make in the second half.Less then two minutes had expired in the third period when Perth coach Rob Beveridge called timeout with the score at 36-all.When McLeod signalled for a time-out five minutes later, the Hawks were up 46-44 after Tim Coenraad’s three-point bomb.Luke Martin drained his third three of the night and the Hawks had a five-point lead. Tragardh boosted his tally to 20 points and Wollongong were up 54-51 heading into the final quarter.With the sold-out WEC rocking, the Hawks stretched the margin to seven when Beveridge burned a time-out with under five minutes remaining.Tragardh was hitting everything, while Davidson was clogging the middle at the defensive end and grabbing every rebound.
