Brilliant Cotton delivers win in Adelaide

Bryce Cotton is in the form of his life which is saying something as the Perth Wildcats superstar put up another 49 points and he led the 'Cats to the come from behind 115-105 road win over Kendric Davis and the Adelaide 36ers.

Davis returned from his two-game suspension for the 36ers and he produced a tremendous performance to end up with 37 points and 11 assists, but it wasn’t enough for Adelaide to overcome Cotton.

The Sixers did build a 13-point lead in the first half but the Wildcats kept in touch largely thanks to Cotton and even more so once his shadow Sunday Dech (13 points) left the court in the second quarter for Adelaide with a hamstring injury.

On the back of his 59-point performance last Sunday against the New Zealand Breakers and then 40 on Friday against the Illawarra Hawks, Cotton only had six points in the first quarter but got rolling especially once Dech left the court.

He put up 17 points in the second quarter, 15 in the third and another 11 in the fourth to finish with 49 to go with five rebounds, four assists and two steals on 14/21 shooting from the field, 5/8 from downtown and 16/16 at the foul line.

Cotton became the first player since Andrew Gaze in 1991 to have three consecutive 40-point games in the NBL to lead the 'Cats to the win in their first of seven straight road games without Keanu Pinder and Kristian Doolittle.

Perth improves to 9-8 with Ben Henshall contributing 15 points, four rebounds, four assists and two steals, Dylan Windler 13 points and seven boards, Next Star Izan Almansa eight points and seven boards, and Todd Withers eight points, two rebounds and two steals.

Adelaide is now 6-8 on a four-game losing streak and again without Montrezl Harrell and DJ Vasiljevic with Davis marking his return in style with Isaac Humphries putting up 25 points and five rebounds, Jarell Martin nine points and seven boards, and Nick Marshall nine points and two assists.

Kendric Davis wasted no time to make his mark on his return for Adelaide scoring 10 points in the first three minutes in a fast start from both teams before Jarell Martin threw down the dunk in transition on the find from Davis.

That gave the 36ers the 20-12 lead after six minutes forcing John Rillie into a timeout and by quarter-time they were on top 32-29 with Perth doing well to stay in touch with Bryce Cotton shaking off Sunday Dech for six points.

Adelaide were feeling good, though, shooting at 65 per cent and finished up producing their highest scoring first half of the season to go into the break leading 60-54.

Davis scored on the buzzer to the delighted of the home fans as he went into half-time with 19 points and seven assists with Dech also scoring 13 points while making life difficult for Cotton but his night was already over with a hamstring injury.

Cotton was up to 23 points with the 17-point quarter to keep Perth within striking distance and then the Wildcats managed to assume their first lead of the game with a Hyrum Harris three-pointer at the midway mark of the third quarter.

Adelaide responded to be back up seven with a triple from Martin but the 'Cats were only three down by three quarter-time thanks to a Cotton three ball on the buzzer to give him 38 for the game already with 10 minutes to play.

Every time Adelaide threatened to pull away Cotton and the Wildcats kept answering as he got over 40 for the third straight game and Ben Henshall hit his second three of the game to keep it a one-point ball game.

Cotton then found both Henshall and Izan Almansa to score to give the 'Cats the four-point lead with 5:45 to play and that soon became eight when Dylan Windler landed a three ball just over a minute later.

Cotton set up Todd Withers for a three that was a dagger with just over a minute to play to push Perth's lead back to eight and they would end up winning by 10 having earlier been down 13.

The 36ers will regain Montrezl Harrell now on Saturday when they host the New Zealand Breakers with the Wildcats having six more road games in-a-row starting in Cairns also on Saturday night.

HUNGRY JACK'S NBL SEASON 2024/25

ADELAIDE 36ERS 105 (Davis 37, Humphries 25, Dech 13)

PERTH WILDCATS 115 (Cotton 49, Henshall 15, Windler 13)

BOX SCORE