![Hawks interim coach Justin Tatum conducts training earlier this week ahead of Illawarra's clash away to the Brisbane Bullets on Sunday. Picture by Robert Peet Hawks interim coach Justin Tatum conducts training earlier this week ahead of Illawarra's clash away to the Brisbane Bullets on Sunday. Picture by Robert Peet](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/kZL4qV6yTxfrWZJxKQxjSN/1e8f9c06-45ee-4f27-9fc4-9028917c684d.jpg/r0_12_5472_3101_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
A first up win. Tick.
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Time off to work on his game plan. Tick.
Now Hawks interim coach Justin Tatum is looking to tick off another thing on Illawarra's to do list - break a 603-day wait and win two games on the bounce.
The Hawks get a chance to do just that when they travel to Brisbane on Sunday to take on the Bullets.
Buoyed by a last-start gritty win over the New Zealand Breakers and having worked hard in training for almost two weeks, Tatum said his players were feeling refreshed and focused for the job at hand.
He added the extended FIBA break had been beneficial for the coaching staff and players alike.
"I think we are starting to get more confident in what we want to run offensively and how we want to start flowing," Tatum said.
"The guys are starting to ask a lot of questions and figuring out the answers on their own. That's the type of basketball we want to implement here.
" We want them creating and reacting and making sure they take the shots that they're capable of making.
"I think the guys have really been falling in line with that and we've been getting better every day."
While Tatum has enjoyed the break he conceded his players were chomping at the bit to get back on court, especially after recording a tough away win.
"The players are definitely keen to get back playing," he said.
"They got their first big win on the road against New Zealand a couple of weeks ago and now we're ready to get back in the lab and try and do the same thing against Brisbane.
"We know it's going to be just as tough opponent, maybe even tougher but I think this time off and time to be able to gel together has been very helpful."
Despite putting up a good defensive performance against the Breakers in their 69-65 victory, the Hawks have struggled in that facet of the game for most of the season. That's why Tatum has focused on shoring up the Hawks defence heading into the Bullets clash.
"That was our major key piece, fixing up how to compete every play and how to work on getting consecutive defensive stops.
"That's been one of our main focus this week, but we also want to be really good offensively.
"So we started to mix both of them together and it's been working well for us in practice."
Tatum is hopeful what the Hawks have worked on during training works against a very big and solid Brisbane outfit.
"They're experienced and they'really big and they have really solid guards in [Nathan] Sobey and [DJ] Mitchell, so we got to find a way to contain them," he said.
"But I think the way we competed against New Zealand, and now we tightened up and had a really good crisp practice, I think we can really compete well against them.
"We did well defensively against the Breakers and I'm glad we had 69 points and they had 65 but we're definitely a more offensive-minded and high powered team than that."
Tatum has been more concerned with getting the Hawks ready to compete but being relatively inexperienced in the league, has turned to his assistant coaches and players to scout the Bullets.
"I've got a lot of good insights from the coaches and the players gave me their insights, they played against certain people, some of their tendencies, what they can and can't do," he said.
"But we don't really want to overflow ourselves with things that Brisbane can do, we just want to know the major things and how to stop them and worry about us.
"The players have all been very professional. They understand that we can't play 12 men in a game, you earn those minutes at practice.
"They've been doing a really good job putting a lot of pressure on me to work on rotations and see what's going to be a best fit for us. That's a good problem to have."
Tatum indicated when he took over from Jacob Jackomas that he wanted to settle on a eight or nine player rotation moving forward.
He said that was still the plan but wanted all his 13 players to be ready to play and do a job when needed.
"That's the advantage of having 13 good guys, but also 13 very good professionals who understand that their number may or may not be called this weekend but next week it might be.
"That was our message to the guys this week. There's always going to be that next man up because w e know we need an eight, nine, 10 man rotation, but you guys should be ready on the bench.
"That's the mentality we want to have, and be ready for the next week if your number hasn't been called .
"Everyone has responded well to this situation."