Goorjian: "We were dominated"

Sydney Kings coach Brian Goorjian knows you can lose games if you still play the right way, but that was anything but the case on Friday night in Perth.

It's still early in NBL25 and Goorjian has been coaching well and truly long enough to know that as long as your team is taking steps forward on a weekly basis, there'll be wins and losses along the way.

Some wins might be ugly or you might lose even if you play well, but what he won't stand for is losing a game because the opposition quite simply outworked them, which was the case on Friday against a Wildcats team missing Bryce Cotton and Tai Webster.

The numbers spoke for everything in the three-point loss, with the Kings having 21 fewer rebounds than the Wildcats, including 20 less at the offensive end, while they only attempted 18 free throws for the night, while the 'Cats made 24 and attempted 13 more.

That's why the Kings lost a game where they shot 49 per cent from the field compared with 36 to their opposition.

"Anything that involved energy, they dominated on us. Coming into this game with our team where it's at, there's been a lot of talk about who we are and how we're the best team in this, but in my mind we have a lot of young guys on here," Goorjian said.

"I thought the young guys tonight, the young ones it was an eye-opener for them. We had trouble getting the ball over the half-court line without Jaylen (Adams) here and I know everyone's got injuries right now, but for us we're vulnerable in that spot and they took advantage of us.

"Then anything that involved energy ... they didn’t beat us, they dominated us. It's how you lose at this stage, not losing. You can progress and move forward and still lose, you can win and not play well, but we lost in a very poor way."

The Kings now have a short turnaround to return home to Sydney on Saturday and get ready to host the New Zealand Breakers on Sunday afternoon, back at Qudos Bank Arena.

However, they come up against a Breakers team decimated by injury, with Dane Pineau, Mitch McCarron, Mojave King and Max Darling all expected to be absent as they were in Thursday's loss in Christchurch to the South East Melbourne Phoenix.

Considering the Breakers will have flown more than 51,000km over the past six weeks by the time of Sunday's game, the Kings will take on a team feeling a similar fatigue to them and both coming off poor losses earlier in the round.

"For us right now rest is our friend, so all I can control right now is trying to get my team fed, trying to get my team recovering and having as much rest as I possibly can," Goorjian said.

"Our schedule right now is really difficult and keeping these guys fresh and competitive is a real challenge for me.

"I don’t throw any excuses there because one of our strengths is our depth, and we've got a lot of bodies, and I'm hoping for a better performance in the areas that we're questioning in the next game.

"But the challenge is keeping guys like Xavier (Cooks), guys like Cam (Oliver) and Keli (Leaupepe) as fresh as I possibly can in between games."