Froling praises 'unselfish' Justin Robinson for leading Hawks resurgence

So said Hawks captain Sam Froling, ahead of Illawarra's crucial clash against the Perth Wildcats on Thursday night at WIN Entertainment Centre.

Froling told the Mercury the whole team had bought into interim coach Justin Tatum's playbook and made sacrifices for the good of the team.

But the 23-year-old felt no one had made more sacrifices to their own game to help the Hawks win, than point-guard Robinson.

"Guys have really embraced what this team needs them to be. A lot of guys have sacrificed what they thought they were coming into or what they thought they should have been.

"They might have wanted to score some more points, but because they've sacrificed for the team,we've been winning games," Froling said.

"In my opinion Justin Robinson's probably the number one for that. He might not be averaging as much as he wanted to coming into the year but what he has done for this team has been such an integral and important role.

"He's coming off the bench now and it's full credit to him. He hasn't complained about it once, he's embraced everything and it rubs off on the group. You see it in the box-score, he's leading the plus minus in a lot of the highest stats.

"His impact has been huge.

"I think it just rubs off on the group as well when someone like him could have gone 'stuff this, I want to get mine' but he didn't, he really sacrificed for the team and it's rubbed off and I think everyone's taken a note out of his book."

This has definitely been the case since Tatum took the reins on the back of a 2-7 start in November.

The Hawks head into their final two regular season games against the Wildcats and away to Melbourne United on Sunday with a 13-13 win/loss record.

A win in Wollongong on Thursday night would ensure the Hawks cannot finish lower than sixth and would see finals basketball, something that seemed a pipe dream when Tatum took over from the sacked Jacob Jackomas.