United hold on despite late Adams heroics

Jaylen Adams almost sparked the Brisbane Bullets to what would have been a miraculous fightback but Melbourne United did enough to hold on for the 95-86 victory to stay perfect this NBL season.

Chris Goulding started his NBL career on the 2007 championship team as a development player at the Bullets and in just his second appearance of this season after a quad injury, torched them at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre in the first half.

He had 15 points including three late triples that saw him overtake John Rillie to sit alone in third position for long-range makes across his 479-game career.

Melbourne were in control by half-time leading 55-37 after a 10-1 start, and were up 20 midway through the fourth quarter.

That's when former league MVP Adams fired the Bullets. Having been relegated to the bench for Brisbane's two games this week after a slow start to the season, he found his aggressive best.

The Bullets went on an 18-1 scoring run to close to three with Adams scoring all but three of those points, but Melbourne held them out.

Milton Doyle scored eight of his 17 points in the last two minutes for United to win by nine with Goulding finishing with 22 points and Tanner Krebs 16.

Import guard Tyson Walker had just five points on 1/10 shooting, but had a United record eight steals along with six assists.

Brisbane are 2-5 and copped another injury blow with NBA championship winner Alex Ducas suffering a lower leg injury two minutes into the game with Sam McDaniel and Mitch Norton already sidelined.

Adams finished with a season-best 29 points and five assists while Casey Prather continued his sparkling form with 26 points, seven rebounds and four steals, and big man Tyrell Harrison added 16 points, 11 rebounds and three blocks.

Melbourne did make a dominant start on the road racing out to a 10-1 lead with that run including three-point bombs to Tanner Krebs and Milton Doyle.

Brisbane responded with a couple of buckets to Casey Prather, but Melbourne remained on top with Krebs knocking down a second three ball and Tom Koppens hitting another for United to be leading 31-16 by the end of one.

United scored the first five points of the second quarter too but the Bullets answered with 12 of the next 15 points to close a 19-point deficit into just 11.

However, Chris Goulding landed three triples leading into half-time to overtake John Rillie as third on the all-time list for 15 points in the half and Melbourne remained in control leading 55-37.

Jaylen Adams did make his first three-pointer of the season to open the second half for Brisbane, and the Bullets got back within nine, but by three quarter-time Melbourne were back in control leading by 16.

That Melbourne advantage was back to 20 with 6:35 remaining but coming out of a Bullets timeout, the home team scored the next 12 points including the last 10 of those coming from Adams in his best outing of NBL26.

Suddenly Adams scored again with just under three minutes to play and it was back to a six-point game and Adams was just warming up. He hit another three ball soon after for an 18-1 Brisbane run to make it a three-point ball game.

Melbourne answered from there including a couple of clutch threes to Doyle, and an and-one after another steal to Tyson Walker, to come away with the nine-point win.

The Bullets are now back on the road to play the New Zealand Breakers next Thursday while the United head straight back home to play host to the Breakers as well this coming Sunday afternoon.

HUNGRY JACK'S NBL SEASON 2025/26

BRISBANE BULLETS 86 (Adams 29, Prather 26, Harrison 16)

MELBOURNE UNITED 95 (Goulding 22, Doyle 17, Krebs 16)

BOX SCORE