Sixers earn measure of revenge on United

Seven days earlier and the Adelaide 36ers were on the brink of imploding but a week later and they made it back-to-back dominant wins this time at home to Melbourne United 100-81 who they got a measure of revenge on.

Things appeared to be about as bad as they could get for the Sixers when they lost a third straight 20-plus point game to Perth on their home floor last Saturday night.

They hit back mighty impressively in Sydney on Monday before coming back for a revenge clash with Melbourne at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre.

It was a contest the 36ers were in control of virtually from the start with their energy something that United had no answers for. Adelaide scored the 19-point win to improve to 9-11 in front of another sold out 9588 crowd.

The 36ers were rewarded for their aggression toward the basket with 26/30 at the foul line while scoring 22 points from Melbourne's 17 turnovers with Montrezl Harrell and Kendric Davis brilliant.

Harrell finished with 28 points and nine rebounds, and Davis 28 points, 11 assists and five boards while the pair combined to go 15/18 at the free-throw line.

Captain DJ Vasiljevic delivered 19 points and five rebounds on 4/6 three-point shooting with Isaac Humphries adding 12 points, five boards and three steals.

"This team is continuing to evolve and this team's growing," Adelaide coach Mike Wells said.

"What you're seeing is a group that's had to go through a lot of adversity for a lot of different reasons and we've come out the other side of it now."

Melbourne have now lost five of the last six games to be 13-9 with five more straight road games to go with Chris Goulding top-scoring with 18 points on 4/8 shooting from downtown.

Hoewver, they only attempted nine free-throws as a team and shot just 36 per cent overall including going 13/41 from beyond the arc.

Shea Ili had 14 points before fouling out in just over 18 minutes, Tanner Krebs 13 points, and Matthew Dellavedova 10 points, nine assists and three rebounds despite also having six turnovers and going 2/9 from deep.

"We didn't value the ball the way we wanted to and we got seriously punished for it any time we turned the ball over," Melbourne coach Dean Vickerman said.

"I thought we were trying to look for some home-run passes when we just needed to move it and be a bit more patient."

It could well have been the most anticipated rematch of the season after what happened at John Cain Arena back on November 17. The 36ers might have been on a mission behind their vocal sold out crowd but Melbourne started the better.

Chris Goulding and Matthew Dellavedova combined for the first five points but Adelaide answered through DJ Vasiljevic and soon went on a 12-0 scoring run that saw 10 of those scored by the dynamic Kendric Davis.

Davis then finished the opening period with a three-point play and the Sixers had all the momentum after one leading 27-17 before the home team scored the first five points of the second frame to go up 15.

Melbourne did answer with triples from Tanner Krebs and Dellavedova, and soon scored nine straight points, but that only cut the Sixers lead to seven and Adelaide pulled away again with a Lat Mayen long ball pushing the advantage to 14.

It was as much as 16 just before half-time with the 36ers still up 55-42 at the half with Davis, Montrezl Harrell, Isaac Humphries and Vasiljevic all scoring in double-figures while they scored 16 points off the 10 Melbourne turnovers.

United did well with 10 offensive rebounds but were only clinging to staying in touch and little changed in the third quarter with Adelaide going into three quarter-time still in control leading by 15 thanks to a layup on the buzzer from Keanu Rasmussen.

Shea Ili had been tasked with guarding Davis for United and was also copping the brunt of the Adelaide crowd. Those fans were delighted when he fouled out early in the fourth to make Melbourne's comeback job all that tougher.

Melbourne never were able to get back within single figures as Adelaide kept their foot down the whole time on the way to the emphatic 19-point win.

The Sixers have another six days until hitting the road to play the Tasmania JackJumpers on Friday night while United will play their third of seven straight away games to the Sydney Kings on Thursday.

HUNGRY JACK'S NBL SEASON 2024/25

ADELAIDE 36ERS 100 (Harrell 28, Davis 28, Vasiljevic 19)

MELBOURNE UNITED 81 (Goulding 18, Ili 14, Krebs 13)

BOX SCORE