Tip-off: Saturday, January 5, 7.30pm (local), Cairns Convention Centre

TV: NBL.TV

Radio: Sunshine FM

Last time they met: Perth 94 (Robbins 16, Lisch 14, Martin 11) d Cairns 59 (Wilson 16, Brebner 11, Rychart 10), Round 23, 2011/12, Challenge Stadium, Perth

The story
While some believe Perth have been playing the same aggressive style for four seasons under coach Rob Beveridge, coaches around the league are noticing a change in the way the Wildcats defend.

Once a predominantly fullcourt man-on-man team, the Wildcats can now be found in a range of zones, each with a different purpose. Beveridge says past experiences against Cairns, and the evolution of opposition teams, meant Perth couldn’t afford to stand still.

“Where we used to be pressure, pressure, pressure, teams now understand how to beat that,” he said.

“You have to look at ways Adelaide and Cairns are beating your press and guess what? You can’t press that way anymore.”

The Wildcats now employ more fullcourt zones to slow their opponents down, and have put in an enormous amount of work to improving their halfcourt containment.

“If teams beat our pressure (in the past) we were pretty soft in the halfcourt. Wollongong, Cairns and those teams who moved the ball could score on us,” Beveridge said.

While the change has been most noticeable this year, Beveridge said it was a multi-year process to make sure his players were comfortable with the adjustments being made.

He understands the enormous challenge Taipans coach Aaron Fearne faces trying to mould a new system for a more offensively minded 2012/13 line-up.

“Fearney controlled the tempo of the game by running the shuffle,” Beveridge said.

“He was as good a coach as you will get with the shuffle, he knew the ins and outs of it so well. But now they’ve got a completely different system and he’s trying to figure things out.”

But there’ll be no sympathy on Saturday night as the Wildcats continue their evolution into a dominant defensive team in the fullcourt and the halfcourt.

“We are a like-sized team now so we can do a lot more switching defence without having too many mismatches,” Beveridge said.

“I've always liked to play our match-up zone and right now I think we are doing it as well as we have ever done.”

The stats
Perth force 15.8 turnovers a game this season compared to 18.5 in 2011/12, but are holding opponents to just 40 per cent field-goal shooting compared to 42 per cent last season.

Jamar Wilson has averaged 19.5 points at 50 per cent from the field, 4.5 assists and 4.3 rebounds in the past four games. The remainder of the team has averaged 53 points at 42 per cent.

Cam Tragardh has averaged just 9.7 points at 40 per cent in his past six games after scoring 16.7 points at 53 per cent in his first seven.

The wrap
When you are having issues getting the ball to your preferred spots the last team you want to see rolling through the airport are the Wildcats.

Led by Damian Martin, Perth know better than anyone what their opponents want to do and how to prevent them doing it.

The Taipans have struggled to penetrate against zones this season and the Wildcats’ expanded repertoire of zones will disrupt, harass or dare the Taipans to shoot out-of-rhythm shots.

Perhaps the home team’s biggest chance is feeding off the post-work of Cam Tragardh, who is in need of a breakout game, but the Taipans haven’t shown they can consistently feed him the ball in advantageous positions.

No doubt Cairns will again try to slow this one down, but barring a horror shooting night from the Wildcats it will be another quiet night for the Orange Army.

Prediction: Wildcats by 9

The Perth Wildcats continued the Taipans' misery in Cairns, winning 85-66 on Saturday night in their first meeting this season.

The Wildcats had an answer for everything the Snakes threw at them, leading comfortably from the start and at every turn.

Kevin Lisch showed all his class to lead the visitors with 26 points, while big Matthew Knight (13 points, seven rebounds) was excellent on return from injury.

Last year’s MVP Lisch and Taipan Jamar Wilson (17 points, 7 rebounds), a close MVP runner-up, were the standouts for their teams but Lisch had more help and that proved the difference.

"He's (Lisch) the MVP and he gets better and better. And for Cairns fans to see him in full flight was pretty special," Perth coach Rob Beveridge said.

"A lot of people talk about the Cedric Jacksons and Jonny Flynns and he wasn't even included in that group. But you saw him hit a no-look one handed hook shot tonight - that's what he can do."

Knight looked the fool when his wide-open dunk popped out in the first quarter, but he put that behind him to finish as one of the visitors' best contributors.

Jesse Wagstaff (15 points, 5 rebounds) and Shawn Redhage (10 points, 7 rebounds) along with 24 Taipans turnovers made sure there were plenty of second chances for their offence.

Even the Taipans’ good work was undone in the second quarter when a Shane Edwards rejection on Lisch, who was in the paint, resulted in a Cameron Tovey three.

That and a Lisch bucket on the final play of the second quarter gave Perth a 49-37 half-time lead.

Earlier in the quarter a bright start from the Taipans, accentuated by a razor sharp assist from Wilson and a long three from Loughton, got the big crowd involved.

But as they did the entire night Perth shunted the comeback, Greg Hire nailing a three from the corner.


"We've struggled up here in the last few years, but we did well to get on top of that crowd because when they get the emotions going it's hard to play in, Beveridge said.

"It was solid but nothing too special for our standard, but obviously a 20-point win on the road in Cairns is outstanding."

Taipans coach Aaron Fearne labelled it, along with last week's loss to New Zealand as some of the club's worst basketball in "few years".

"They kicked our butt from start to finish," he said.

"It's poise and composure (that is lacking) and turnovers, way too many turnovers, giving them too many looks."

Both teams’ field goal percentages crept close to 50 per cent by the main break, but it was a different story in the first 10 minutes.

It took more than five minutes for the Snakes to score their first points and they made just four buckets for the term, and only some wayward shooting from Perth kept the home team in the game.

The second and third quarters were fast-paced, high-scoring affairs, but once the Wildcats had the finish line in sight they shut the Taipans down and cruised to victory.

Perth Wildcats 85 (Lisch 26, Wagstaff 15, Knight 13)
Cairns Taipans 66 (Wilson 17)

Crowd: 4013 at Cairns Convention Centre