Andrew Gaze's Perth "concern"

The Perth Wildcats have all but locked up second position on the NBL24 ladder, but have teams found a way to counteract superstar guard Bryce Cotton ahead of this season’s Finals campaign?

The Wildcats have lost two of their last three games, and their only win in that span was against a severely undermanned South East Melbourne side in a clash where Cotton finished with 21 points and eight assists.

The near-consensus MVP-elect scored only 13 points in each of Perth’s recent defeats to Illawarra and New Zealand, and he hit a combined 5-26 shots across the two performances.

Seven-time NBL MVP Andrew Gaze says Perth’s offensive reliance on Cotton is concerning, given the tightness of the competition this season.

“This league has thrown up some extraordinary results this season, so you can’t take anything for granted. The concerning thing would be if you go back across the entire season, when Bryce Cotton is not near his best [Perth] has had some challenges,” Gaze said on SEN WA.

“We saw that earlier on in the season when his shooting percentages were down [the Wildcats] dug themselves a bit of a hole, once Bryce got back to being Bryce Cotton, things looked pretty good.

“Again, on the weekend Bryce didn’t have one of his better outings and they came up short so I think that would be a little bit of a concern, but going up against Cairns who are part of the playoff picture, they should be in good shape.”

Perth is currently two games behind top-placed Melbourne United with just three games to play, but the 10-time NBL champions are two games ahead of the third-placed JackJumpers. Barring a run of disastrous proportions from either United or the Wildcats, Perth will almost certainly enter the regular season in second place.

Perth’s relative safety towards the top end of the ladder has led Gaze to believe the recent defeats to the Hawks and Breakers could have a silver lining for the club.

“They’ve been playing at a high-pace style and when the shots aren’t dropping the thing doesn’t look all that nice. You have those days and you’d rather have them now, and I think it’s a little bit of a wake-up call,” Gaze continued.

“Melbourne United went through a similar stretch, when they went on that seven-game road trip they lost four of them and they had a huge advantage.

“Sometimes at this stage of the season you get a little bit of a wake-up call to sharpen things up and in hindsight it may turn out to be a good result.”

The Wildcats will play just once in Round 19, when they host the Cairns Taipans at RAC Arena on Saturday night.

The game will tip-off at 8pm, live on ESPN via Kayo.