Perth Lynx Preview – Home to Geelong United (Bendat)
The Perth Lynx will be looking to hit back from a loss in Adelaide last week and return to Bendat Basketball Centre in style on Friday night hosting Geelong United to set up a battle for second with the Townsville Fire.
Destiny still remains in the hands of the Lynx if they want to finish the WNBL season in second position to earn home court advantage for the semi finals, but that’s only if they rebound with a win over Geelong on Friday night.
With the Fire now on a seven-game winning streak and finishing the season with great momentum, the Lynx have to win on Friday night to then set up a mouth watering match up in Townsville next Sunday where the winner will finish second.
The Lynx can’t afford to look past Geelong, though, with United still a chance to play finals in their first season in the WNBL should they win their last two games.
That sets up a crucial match up now at Bendat Basketball Centre with both teams needing to win for different reasons.
It will be the third time the two teams have played one another this WNBL season as well but it will be their first ever meeting at Bendat Basketball Centre.
The first clash took place at the Perth High Performance Centre back on December 23 where the Lynx scored the 25-point victory.
It was a much tighter affair at The Geelong Arena on January 12 where the Lynx managed to escape with the three-point win.
Even though the loss to Adelaide was just one of those nights for the Lynx, co-captain Anneli Maley knows that it provided plenty for them to learn on at the same time.
Even if that lesson is that they can’t play worse than putting up just 69 points on 29 per cent field goal shooting along with making 10/23 at the foul line, and losing a game by 18 points despite taking seven extra field goals and nine more free throws than your opposition.
“We played terrible, we were so bad. You’re not going to win many games when you shoot like 14 (29) per cent from the field,” Maley told 91.3 SportFM.
“We couldn’t make a layup and you’re not going to win many games when you shoot the ball the way that we did. We were even something like 9/27 (10/23) from free throws and it was just a train wreck, but you’re not going to go a whole season being perfect.
“Obviously we’ll try to learn from it and as a group we’ve come together to talk about how we want to approach our wins and losses, and have regrouped.
“Losing is important and you learn more from them than your wins so it’s important that we band together and come away changing things while also giving credit to Adelaide who were awesome. We didn’t play championship calibre basketball but it’s all fixable stuff.”
While the Lynx are focused on bouncing back themselves from the tough loss in Adelaide, Maley is fully aware that Geelong are not going to be any pushovers considering they are fighting to keep their own finals prospects alive.
“They can still make finals so they’re going to come out firing and it’s a must win game for them,” Maley said.
“They are going to play with a lot of intensity and mass effort so that will make them a really good test for us coming off a loss to be able to meet their intensity and physicality.
“They’re a tall group across the board and they have some super talented players, and they are very aggressive with their rebounding and on the glass.
“They play a similar sort of style to us so it will be a test for us to match their energy, but it’s just about focusing on our defensive intensity because that will get our offence going.”
CYGNETT WNBL SEASON 2024/25
Round 15 – Perth Lynx v Geelong United
Venue – Bendat Basketball Centre
Tip-off – Friday February 7, 7pm AWST
Tickets – Available by clicking here
How to watch – Live, free and on demand on 9Now