Table of Plenty Coaches' Round Table: Round 2

Welcome to the Table of Plenty Coach’s Round Table! This weekly article will provide you with some behind-the-scenes insight from our team of coaches regarding our performance from the previous round, thanks to Table of Plenty, the Official Snack Partner of Melbourne United.

Offence - Lead Assistant Coach, Keegan Crawford

“The Phoenix are one of the best teams in the league at getting up the floor and pressuring you. I think our guys did a good job of executing our game plan and making sure we were unselfish, attacking their pressure and not just walking the ball up the court. Our guys did a great job attacking coverages and getting into space.”

In the Throwdown win, United made 12 three-pointers, five more than in the season opener whilst shooting at a better percentage than in that game. 

United are 8-2 over their last 10 games when they make 12 or more threes at over 35% shooting, showing the catalytic role getting into space and hitting their outside shots can play on winning.
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Defence - Video Coordinator and Development Coach, Seb Lees

“Our game plan was centred around disrupting the flow of South East’s open-court offence and slowing them down and I think we did a really good job of that. We worked on throwing a lot of different looks at their offence in practice during the week and I think we executed it really well in game”

United put the Phoenix in a vault on Thursday, holding them to just 9.8% from three and 27.8% from the field, both numbers franchise lows for South East.

In the NBL’s 40 minute era, a team has never won shooting below 30% from the field.

‍Head Coach Jacob Chance’s final word

“I think we did a lot better of a job playing out a full 40 minutes than we did in the Adelaide game. We started to show our identity on the court and play our brand of basketball which at its best, is going to be really hard to beat. In the Throwdown, it was our defensive cohesion that made it really hard on the opposition and as a coaching staff we’re really happy with that. Going into the double-header this weekend, we still need to drill in a few more of our key principles on offence, but we definitely made some moves in the right direction last Thursday.”

United will next take the court as the away team against the Tasmania JackJumpers inside MyState Bank Arena onThursday October 1 from 7:30pm. Watch it live on ESPN or Disney+. 

The team will then return to John Cain Arena on Saturday 3 October to take on the Cairns Taipans. Tip-off is at 7:30pm, and tickets are still available via AXS. 

Can’t make the game? Watch it live on ESPN or Disney+, or live and free on 9Now.