Veterans lead Lady Hawks to crucial win over youthful Slammers

THE experience and class of Antonio Edmondson and Deanna Smith led the Perry Lakes Hawks to a bounce back victory over the South West Slammers on Sunday and CJ Jackson knew full well they needed to hit back after Friday's loss to the Stirling Senators.

The Hawks came into the weekend solid in fourth position but a loss on Friday to the Senators could have left them a little vulnerable unless they were able to bounce against the Slammers on Sunday at Bendat Basketball Centre.

It was the experienced leadership and quality of Edmondson and Smith in the end that ensured the Hawks did come away with the 91-54 victory to improve to a 12-7 record and remain in fourth position where it does appear they will still even though a month still remains in the season.

The Slammers started strongly and continued to do solidly to make it a good contest in the first half with the Hawks managing to just hold a 45-33 lead at the half.

However, Perry Lakes' depth and experience wore down South West as the second half rolled on and the Hawks ended up winning by 37 points.

Edmondson was playing just her third game back with the Hawks after her time with the New Zealand national team and she had a terrific performance with 21 points, seven rebounds, four assists and four steals.

Smith also had 19 points, five rebounds, four assists and two steals for the Hawks while Kate Anthony contributed 17 points and four boards, Annika Renkema 11 points and seven rebounds, and Sarah Donovan eight points and 15 boards.

Coach CJ Jackson was relatively pleased with the performance but he knew the Hawks had to bounce back from Friday's loss.

"I'm happy with the result today but I can still see some areas we need to really improve on to be considered one of the top four who can win a championship," Jackson said.

"I think on Friday we just did not play well as a group. We did some things that were uncharacteristic for our team and we had to redeem ourselves and get back to playing simple basketball which we didn’t do on Friday night and they took advantage of us."

Jackson also saw some parts of Edmondson's game that could have been better but he immediately noticed the Lady Hawks grew an extra leg once she returned.

"Toni was good even though a couple of finishes underneath the basket kind of let her down," Jackson said.

"I thought she played well in her first game back and even at training on the Thursday prior to us playing Cockburn that was one of our best sessions of the season because she came back.

"The girls were really ready for her to come back. The girls did a great job with her out and some of our key elements out, but now that we've got the bonus back it's making us play a little bit stronger basketball."

Despite the eventual margin, the Slammers never stopped fighting with Courtney Bayliss top-scoring with 18 points and nine rebounds.

Dena English added 15 points, six rebounds, five assists and two blocked shots, Raya Thompson eight points and Ebony Bilcich five.

Slammers coach Julieann Bissaker had a feeling her group could find it tough up against the Hawks after the week they had and that's how it ended up playing out.

"It's a reflection of our week, we've had a pretty tough week. We had some girls away at Junior Country Week hence our rotation today wasn’t what it should have been," Bissaker said.

"We've had some injuries and we've had some sickness so it was a pretty tough week at training and I think that was reflected in that game."

The Slammers have gone through this season without a restricted player and the group is remarkably young. From Sunday's team, Rebecca Preston was the oldest at just 24 while there were three 22-year-olds, a 21-year-old, three 18-year-olds and a 17-year-old.

With that youth and inexperience, coming up against veteran stars like Smith and Edmondson was going to be tough. Bissaker acknowledges that and deserves credit for building a group with an eye to the future, and she hopes they learn a lot from those at a class above they play against.

"That experience makes such a difference. They've not only got experienced players, but they have players experienced at a higher level of basketball. That makes a huge difference just knowing where to go, where to be and how to get the ball to somebody," Bissaker said.

"I hope our girls can learn from playing against those types of players. They can look and see what they do, and see that it's good basketball and then try to replicate that themselves.

"They get the chance to look at the vision now and they can learn from it. It's the toughness too and when you're playing at a higher level you have to play tough. Hopefully they get that from that game as well."

Article by Chris Pike
Photo by Sebpix Photography




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