ONE of the biggest things I’ve learned in my years coaching in the NBL is that long stretches on the road can make or break teams.
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You’re really living in each other’s pockets through all the waiting around in airports, all the time on buses, all the time in hotel rooms. If there are any underlying issues within the group, that environment can really bring them to the surface.
But when you’re a new group still trying to come together, time on the road can be invaluable and that’s definitely been the case for us so far this season.
In a 28-game season you break things up into four blocks of seven and we all knew as a group that our 2-5 start to the season wasn’t good enough. We were in a hole. There were a whole host of pressures, internally and externally that we didn’t handle as well as we could have.
By getting out on the road and away from all the pressures and all the the distractions you have at home, we were able to put a line under it and start again.
Between two games in New Zealand and another in Perth we’ve traveled 14,000 kilometres. It’s physically very taxing but I believe it was a blessing in disguise. We have new personnel and a lot of guys with more introverted personalities than some others.
It takes time for them to feel comfortable in a new team environment and that’s what time on the road gives you. You’re forced to adapt to each other and it creates that respect within the group.
There’s no doubt our team chemistry has got better and better as we’ve gone along. It’s also given us plenty of time away to have some honest chats about where we were really at and what we’re about.
It’s the same challenge we face now heading into our crucial third quarter of the season. Obviously we’re much happier with our second block of seven (5-2) than our first but I’ve given the boys two days off to freshen up and told them to come back with the slate wiped clean and ready to start from scratch again.
We’ve got Brisbane twice and Cairns and Sydney all on the road so it’s a really tough ask but, if we can navigate that stretch, we’ve got the bulk of that fourth block at home which sets us up well for a run to the finals.