How Crawford's 'masterpiece' led Tassie to title

When Melbourne United started Game 5 on fire, the JackJumpers needed someone to step up to keep them in the contest in the biggest game of the season.

Tasmania is a team that was chock full of star talent and players who had thrived in different moments in the series to that point. Jack McVeigh, Milton Doyle, Will Magnay or Majok Deng looked the most likely candidates to light it up, but instead it was the most under fire player on the team - Jordon Crawford.

The diminutive guard had been benched down the stretch of tight contests in favour of development player Sean Macdonald for the bulk of Tasmania’s Finals campaign, and with Macdonald starting the game in lieu of Anthony Drmic, Crawford looked the odd man out in a ball-handling heavy backcourt.

Instead, he pulled together one of the most incredible first half performances ever seen in the history of the NBL. He dropped 27 points in the first 20 minutes of play to help keep Tasmania within striking distance of the home side, from which his teammates took over.

“27 points in the first half of a Game 5 to keep your team afloat on the opposition’s home floor is a masterpiece,” former NBL champion Peter Hooley said on NBL Now.

“When Tassie needed him most, when they were down 10 in the first quarter, they couldn’t get the scoreboard ticking over, he just put on a clinic.

“It speaks to the player he is and the person he is. He struggled in the post-season compared to his level we saw so many times I the regular season – he was well below that.

“Scott Roth would have been talking to him after every game, probably in the lead up to Game 5 saying ‘we just need one game for you to break out of it’, and he chose to do it in a Game 5 for the championship.”

Damon Lowery has been one of the biggest supporters of Jordon Crawford during the NBL24 campaign, and had previously elected the guard as president of his ‘little big man society’.

While Crawford came under immense criticism for his struggles leading into the final game of the series, Lowery says he never lost faith in him.

“Ever since he set foot in NBL24, when I saw him dropping buckets I said that guy is a scorer, that’s why he’s here, he’s here to score. Yes, his scoring dipped – that doesn’t mean you can’t score, it just means you’re off,” Lowery said.

“We saw the same thing with Bryce Cotton at the start of the year, he couldn’t make a shot either and nobody was saying Bryce Cotton couldn’t play.

“He stepped up and never lost faith in who he was. His issues were finding a balance between being that plutonium dude, and the Jackie way.

“Seany Mac has more ‘Jackie way’ about him than Jordon Crawford, Jordon Crawford is just like ‘give me the ball, nobody in the league can guard me’ ... in that particular game he turned it on, and I was not the least bit surprised."