DJ's captaincy key to Sixers emergence

DJ Vasiljevic's shooting might earn him the highlights, but coach Mike Wells has lauded his leadership right through this season, as he marvels at the growth in connection and communication from the Adelaide 36ers.

You can never underestimate the importance of having a strong leader for any successful team and that's exactly what Wells is seeing with Vasiljevic for the 36ers.

While the outsiders might see Vasiljevic as a dynamic three-point shooter, and that was on show with seven triples in the first quarter and 10 for the game last Sunday in Cairns.

However, he has had just as significant impact on the wins since away to Sydney and at home to New Zealand, even with a combined 23 points on 5/12 three-point shooting.

It has been his ability to bring the group together and lead by example, and especially against Sydney to absorb the pressure the Kings put on him to get his teammates involved and in positions to score.

It's been a lot longer that Wells has admired his leadership, though, and that dates right back to when he first arrived in Adelaide in August before he was even made head coach.

"DJ's leadership has been unwavering. You can make a point that it's been more noticeable here at the end, but it has not wavered since August," Wells said.

"It might not have stood out because there was more things going on and this team was forming our identity, and how we were going to play, but DJ hasn’t wavered. Not since day one.

"I'll take a little exception that his leadership is different right now because I don’t think so, but those plays on the floor that are unselfish and winning type plays.

"Trez has been making them, so as DJ and I saw Isaac Humphries run 94 feet with under two minutes to go and tip the ball out of bounds in a game that was still 16 or 18 points.

"Those are just unselfish, unwavering winning type of plays, and what you've got is a bunch of guys willing to do that right now for the team so the we is a little bit greater than the me right now."

Again on the outside Vasiljevic might be viewed as a shooter and scorer, but that underestimates the significant role he played as someone willing to do everything to help his team win in two championships previously at the Kings.

Then when he arrived in Adelaide last season, the immediate impact he had on the group beyond any scoring he put up, was that he brought that winning mentality to the group, and someone to hold everyone to account.

That's why he couldn’t care less how many shots he gets or points he scores, he just wants to contribute to Adelaide winning.

He sees no reason why their current momentum can't take them a long way.

"Obviously what we've endured throughout this season, not many teams have done it in NBL history in my opinion," Vasiljevic said.

"We're finally all healthy together, we're listening to the coaching staff, we're gelling on the court and we're having fun.

"I think we've got what it takes, but we've got three games to try and push ourselves a bit higher.

"Maybe we finished fifth to give us a home court advantage, but we just have to take it a game at a time and then when the Play-In and Playoffs come, that's when we're about that."

The Sixers are now the form team of the NBL on the longest current winning streak of three straight matches following Sunday's 16-point home victory against the Breakers.

That gives Adelaide three straight wins by a combined 49 points against Cairns, Sydney and New Zealand with the Sixers having won six of the last eight games to be solid in sixth position at 13-13.

It's the first time that the 36ers have had a .500 record since the start of December. It continues a mighty impressive turnaround since three straight 20-plus point losses to have now won six of eight, but even those two losses were strong showings on the road to Tasmania and Perth.

The two areas that Wells sees as key to the Sixers putting themselves right in the championship discussion has firstly been the defence.

The simple numbers are that in the last eight games the 36ers are only conceding 91.0 points while in the previous eight they were giving up 104.3, so that in itself shows how significant the transformation has been.

But perhaps even more important for Wells is that communication that he's now seeing amongst the playing group both in the locker room, during timeouts and then to make sure they are executing out on the floor.

"Our level of communication and organisation, and attention to detail on the defensive end, is night and day different now," Wells said.

"Those guys are talking, they're communicating, they're saying the right things and everything that we've done has been on the defensive end.

"We've gotten to a point where all of a sudden it's different and from a coaching standpoint, when I come into the timeout huddle and guys are talking about defence, that's it, I'm done and I'm good.

"Literally they can figure out the offence. I still think there's a different level for this team to go to, several levels to be honest with you, but it's exciting to be able to put ourselves in a position to play meaningful games."