Clark: 'Bring the energy'

Ian Clark has pinpointed ‘energy’ as a crucial deciding factor in Thursday’s Playoff Series opener between Melbourne and Illawarra, and the newly crowned Best Sixth Man says his side has been keeping a close eye on the NBL24 Finals so far.

The Hawks’ Monday night Play-In victory over New Zealand has seen them advance to a best-of-three Playoff Series against the top-seeded United, and Thursday’s clash will be the first time Melbourne has hit the court in an official capacity since their Round 20 game against the same opposition.

United emerged as five-point winners on that occasion, and swept the Hawks in their three-game regular season series.

“They’re (Illawarra) a hungry team, they play with a lot of energy, they’re playing well as of late and we’ve been seeing their trend over the last couple of weeks leading into the Playoffs,” Clark said.

“They’re a high-level team that can punish you in many ways if you’re not up to speed and able to match their energy and offensive firepower. We’ve been watching the last few games and one of our keys is to make sure we can come out and match their energy.

“The last couple of weeks have been more about us, not knowing who we were going to play, there are a few things we’ve been watching film about trying to tidy up in our offence and defence, but now being able to look forward to playing Illawarra and focusing on their key guys and key plays and make sure we’re ready for Thursday.”

The Perth Wildcats have been in a similar situation to Melbourne, in that they won’t have played in almost three weeks before their Playoff Series kicks off against Tasmania, and Wildcats head coach John Rillie brought referees into training in the hopes of simulating a game-like feel in preparation for the series.

Rillie’s Melbourne United counterpart, Dean Vickerman, oversaw a pair of full-speed, full-contact scrimmages in the lead-up to Thursday’s game against the Hawks, and he feels his team is in a good position heading into the clash.

“We had two really quality scrimmages that were highly competitive, we came through healthy after all our contact sessions which is always something in the back of your mind that you want to really compete and simulate game situations but you want to come through healthy and we’re in a really good place there,” Vickerman said.

“The focus for the last two weeks has been on ourselves and I think that’s been a real positive for us, to get individual team mindset right about how we attack this Playoff Series, how do we look when we’re at our best, and if things aren’t going right how to we make sure we’re able to get onto the next play and move on.

“Everyone’s geared up a little bit. Once the Playoffs actually started it was only a week away, and on Monday night it was only a couple of days away, so I think there’s been a really good build-up until this last part.

“Until you actually get out there and compete at the highest level and say ‘are we ready for it? Has the simulation we’ve done prepared us to go into this sudden-death situation?”

“We played Illawarra recently so it’s tweaking the scout – obviously they’ve changed their starting lineups and different things – but we’re looking forward to it.”

Melbourne’s clash with Illawarra will tip off at 7:30pm AEDT, live on ESPN via Kayo, and 10 Play.