A TOUGH season for the Mount Gambier Pioneers ended on Saturday night with a loss in the final minor round of the South East Australian Basketball League 2018 season.
Mount Gambier faced a double header on the weekend, with a win against Melbourne Tigers Friday night at the Icehouse to provide a slim chance to reach the playoffs.
The Pioneers travelled to Melbourne to face Sandringham Sabres Saturday, but went down, which put them out of contention and unable to defend their 2017 championship title.
At the end of the season the side finished eighth on percentage, with healthier numbers than other teams on the same amount of wins, but once the league took head-to-head results into account, the Pioneers dropped down to 10th and out of the running.
Both final-round games pushed the Pioneers to the limit, with the Tigers coming back from a half-time deficit of 15 points, to lead early in the final stanza.
With a minute to play in the game scores were tied up, with the Pioneers able to hold on to claim the win by just four points.
Lewis Thomas topped the score sheet for the Pioneers with an impressive double-double consisting of 19 points and 13 rebounds, with 12 of those rebounds at the defensive end of the court.
Alex Marzette managed 18 points, Erik Burdon 12 and Tom Daly 11.
But it was a different ball game against the Sabres.
In a see-sawing match the Pioneers trailed at the first break by five points, but in a second-quarter blitz out scored the Sabres to take a handy seven-point advantage to the long break.
The Sabres fought back in the third, but the Pioneers still held the lead at the final break, but only by two points.
However, the home side went on a 9-0 run early in the final stanza, then mid-way through held the lead by 10 points.
From there the margin blew out to 17, before the Sabres settled for a 14-point win and the Pioneers’ hopes of a title defence were dashed.
This time it was Marzette who topped the Pioneers’ score sheet with 19 points, ahead of Sam McDaniel with 13, Tom Daly 11 and Luke Jamieson 10.
Considering the trials the defending champions have faced this season, to even be in with a chance heading into the final round was something special, with injury woes ravaging the side all year.
The opening half of the season saw a struggle, with both Brad Hill and Majok Deng on the sidelines through injury.
Hill would eventually retire from the sport, while Deng never returned to the court after the first game, later heading to the USA.
In the meantime Daly sustained an injury, meaning three of the starting five sat on the sidelines.
The bench players stood tall to taste some success, but once it was apparent Hill would not return and Deng would take no further part in the season, it was a matter of finding new personnel to see the season out and challenge for a top-eight position.
That came in the form of McDaniel and Marzette, who both showed plenty of promise early.
Marzette came later in the picture, with little time to adjust, while McDaniel would suffer his own injury that would force him off the court until the final round.
At the end of the day the Pioneers needed just one more victory to make the playoffs, with a couple of close games during the season costly.
Coach Richard Hill was making no excuses.
He said his side had a chance to claim the win Saturday night, but did not play well, although accepted that could have been due to the huge workload on the limited bodies available late in the season.
“We had destiny in our own hands and were not able to take care of business Saturday night,” he said.
“But that probably reflects where we are at.
“There have been mitigating circumstances, but at the same time there were games I felt we could have performed better in.
“Saturday night was one of those.
“Maybe the guys were just beat down that hard because it has been really tough and we had nothing left.”
Hill said his gut feel was the players were simply “fried”.
He said the last few rounds had proven tough to maintain the energy, with constant changes to the roster and players competing less than 100pc fit.
“We have not really played well since the patch of four games in eight days,” Hill said.
“The last three of those we played our best basketball.
“We beat Ballarat on their home court, we beat Nunawading here, then the night after we beat Frankston who had a pretty good lineup.
“My gut feel is that took so much out of the guys we ran out of emotional and physical energy.”
Considering those mitigating factors, to come so close was impressive, but Hill said by the nature of the players, they did not accept that.
“We feel like we still should have been able to do better,” he said.
“That’s how you should feel – you cannot use excuses.
“We had a reasonable amount of talent on the floor, but that talent has not been together for long.
“It was difficult to coach the group because it was never the same each week.
“We struggled trying to get our systems in place because there was constant change.
“They are things other teams have to deal with as well, but we just got smacked pretty hard this year.”
Hill said it was still too early to have any real idea of the team structure for next season, but the plan would be to hold as much of the roster together as possible.
