"Historical arse-whooping": The dilemma facing 36ers

The dust may have settled on Saturday night’s historic Game 1 win by Sydney, but the series is only just getting started.

As confident as Adelaide will be going back to their home court, NBL champion Damon Lowery said it’s hard to mentally bounce back from an “historical arse-whooping” like that.

“You're getting on the plane thinking, damn, we’re not even close to this team,” Lowery said on Monday’s episode of NBL Overtime.

“[If] they lost by 16 or 14 [points], you can probably live with that, but 44 is historical arse-whooping, and that’s a little bit different.”

Working in the Sixers’ favour, though, is the six-day break between Game 1 and Game 2, allowing them plenty of time to make adjustments.

“Normally, it's going to be hard to win those first games, so there's a feel-out process, but I think they will have something up their sleeve, for sure, on Friday,” NBL champion Pete Hooley said.

“They know they’re going to have to win one of the road [games to win this series], so maybe they think the short turnaround between Game 2 and 3 is better suited to that.”

Lowery is intrigued to see the response by Mike Wells’ team on both sides of the ball.

“They need a plan B for offence [apart from just relying on Bryce], and they need a plan A, B, C, D for defence,” he said.

“We keep talking about Bryce (Cotton), and how he’s going to get off, but it’s going to be extremely difficult when you have four other guys who are designed to look for Bryce and not look to score themselves. That's going to be an issue.

“Let's just say that offensive issue gets solved, let's just say everybody plays well, then what the hell are you going to do on the other end?

“Now Mike [Wells] has a dilemma. He's got a couple of guards that score well, but don't defend well. Then he got a couple of guards who defend well, but can't score well. That's a hell of a dilemma.

“You know what he does sometimes? He puts all four of them out there and just hopes something happens. But that four-guard offence, you've got to get rid of that, it is death. Total death. Nothing good is going to come of it, especially against the Kings.”

>> Championship Series schedule, tickets & how to watch

One of those guards Lowery is talking about is NBA veteran John Jenkins III, whocontributed just eight points across 16 minutes on Saturday.

“John Jenkins, what did we bring him out here for? What is he out here to do?,” Lowery said.

“He is the ninth man in Game 1, which is preposterous. The dude is one of the best shooters [in the competition].”

The NBL26 Championship Series, between Sydney and Adelaide, continues on Friday from 7.30pm AEDT on Friday, live on ESPN and 10 Drama.