Depth on the bench hasn’t always been the Wollongong Hawks’ strongest suit.

But unlike previous years, the Hawks recruited so well in the off-season that their back-up crew is one of the league’s best.

Last weekend Adam Ballinger averaged 13 points and 5.5 rebounds off the bench in first-round games against Townsville and Sydney, while fellow back-up Brad Hill was similarly effective with 8.5 points and 4.5rebounds.

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The pair is being counted on to provide a lift off the bench in Friday night’s road duel with title holders Perth.

‘‘It’s great to play for a team that can go 10-deep,’’ Wollongong guard Gary Ervin said.

‘‘That’s going to be the biggest key to our season, that we can just run a lot of bodies at teams.

‘‘We were a little sluggish to start the game against Townsville, and Balls and Hilly came out and just kept us in that game.’’

Perhaps the most impressive aspect of Wollongong’s 1-1 start to the season is that they rarely hit their straps in either game.

They came from 11 down to beat the Crocodiles by eight and almost pulled off another comeback 24 hours later against the Kings, despite being out of sync most of the night.

‘‘Last weekend was a bit of a shambles with people still trying to get up to speed,’’ Hawks captain Oscar Forman said.

‘‘We had portions of quarters where we were horrible and completely outplayed. But we also had important parts of the game where we flicked the switch and completely outplayed them.

‘‘You’re kind of happy to go 1-1 in your first weekend after a lot of changes late in the preseason, but we still feel that the Sydney game slipped away. It was there for us to win. If it wasn’t for a couple of missed shots and poor defensive plays, we could easily be 2-0.’’

Forman agrees with Ervin that the Hawks have limitless potential.

‘‘It really shows that if we get our stuff together that we can be great,’’ he said.

‘‘If we get on the same page offensively and defensively, we can be dangerous. On the other hand, we can be on different pages and be that team that spluttered through the third quarter against Townsville.

‘‘It’s not like it’s automatically going to happen. It’s going to take a lot of hard training sessions to get the understanding to make it happen, but it can be good.’’

Forman wasn’t his usual accurate self from the three-point line last week, making a combined 5/15 in two games.