NBL Championship Series Takeaways: JackJumpers level the series in defensive 'slug fest'

HOBART, Australia -- Game 2 of the 2024 NBL Championship Series was, for better or worse, an absolute grind.

Scott Roth called it a "slug fest"; a physical, chippy battle that ended with the Tasmania JackJumpers walking away from their loud-as-hell home fans with a 82-77 win over Melbourne United, tying the series at 1-1.

United jumped out to a 15-point lead early in the second half, but the JackJumpers were able to tighten things up and make timely baskets on the other end to give themselves a chance late in the contest.

There were some questionable calls that went against United -- a thoughtless unsportsmanlike foul upgrade, as well as a look-at-me-and-my-whistle jump ball decision -- which ever-so-slightly took some of the shine away from the JackJumpers' win. But, make no mistake, we saw a gutsy, locked-in fourth quarter from the home team that earned them the much-needed victory.

Tasmania's defence steps up when it matters

When United jumped out to a 55-40 advantage early in the third quarter, it looked like we were headed to a sweep. The road team had come to Hobart and stunned the JackJumpers with their activity defensively, which then allowed them to push the break and get easier scores.

The JackJumpers showed a heap of resilience, though. They found some new-found pop offensively, which then translated to a higher work rate on the defensive end. Will Magnay's positioning and patience helped the JackJumpers bend United's offence how they wanted to, leading to consistent stops. After that 15-point United lead, the JackJumpers would outscore their opponents 42-22 the rest of the way.

Roth's team held United to just 91.1 points per 100 possessions -- Melbourne's worst offensive game of the season -- thanks in large part to Magnay's presence, Marcus Lee's timing and athleticism, and Sean Macdonald's ability to just be solid as a point-of-attack option. United shot just 20-of-48 (41.7 percent) from inside the paint, which is well below what you'd expect from them; Vickerman's group finding it difficult to get clean looks through Tasmania's size.

"It was more about shrinking the floor down a little bit and being in the areas we need to be in, being a little more stable guarding the ball one on one, not getting beat in some areas," Roth said of his team's defence.

"Like anything else, when the ball starts to go in on the offensive end, you get a little more excited to play defence. That was also a factor."

United has been a top-two offence all season long -- and showed that in Game 1 -- but the force the JackJumpers played with for the last 15 minutes of the game made things difficult. Roth took a page out of the Illawarra Hawks' book by overplaying some of United's key offensive threats and living with the results of giving decent looks to the rest, and it worked.

JackJumpers embrace the pressure... literally

United playing with their signature perimeter pressure is a catch-22.

On one hand, it makes things unbelievably difficult for the likes of Milton Doyle and Jack McVeigh to truly find any real rhythm. The combination of Shea Ili, Matthew Dellavedova, and Luke Travers have been working overtime, making sure pick-up points are high and that the early connection is there, and we saw the fruits of it in the third quarter, when that disruption led to United getting stops and pushing the ball.

The problem is it can lead to foul trouble; Ili, Ian Clark, and Jo Lual-Acuil Jr. all fouled out in this one. That then makes someone overthink the act of being physical, which subsequently creates openings for your opponent. Heading into the fourth quarter, the JackJumpers were finding their spots a lot better; attacking the physicality with force, getting to those in-between areas and making quality reads, with everyone being more assertive from a scoring standpoint.

This was an elite Ili game, on both ends, but he fouled out toward the end of the fourth period. Some of those fouls came from Ili's defensive force, while there were also some ill-advised gambles -- stemming from his desire to make early connection -- that didn't help his cause.

"Well, we hope we can [play with physicality]," Vickerman said.

"That's what we wanna do. If that's resulting in three of our key guys not being on the floor, we'll just have to look at... I thought there were three or four fouls that we can fix. They were after an error, different things, charges, four or five fouls in discipline; not from being physical or connection. If we get rid of those, I think we still have some people in the game."

The thing is, United's defence was largely elite on Friday night, like it was in Game 1; Doyle and McVeigh were a combined 9-of-28 from the field, and United allowed just 97 points per 100 possessions, which is the JackJumpers' worst offensive showing of the season. If we zoom in to just the end of the third and most of the fourth quarter, though, it seemed like JackJumpers found some things that worked, playing with more of a pop and doing a better job getting those two, in particular, in better spots.

"Rest, first of all, was a big key for us," Roth said, on why his team found that pop offensively.

"You can't not think that the X-factor is obviously having a home court to your advantage. If you take advantage of it, like we did tonight, it's fantastic thing."

Macdonald also played a big role in the JackJumpers finding their way offensively over the course of the game. He gets extended minutes because Jordon Crawford -- who had 13 points in the first quarter -- can be unplayable at times, due to the way he's often targeted on the other end of the floor. Macdonald stepped up, not just as a shot-maker, but from a general creation standpoint; absorbing United's pressure, getting to his spot, and making smart reads for himself or others.

It doesn't feel like United needs to panic

And they definitely won't.

The group is too experienced to put their collective heads down after this sort of loss, where all of the indicators seemed completely fine for United, who were the better team for the majority of the matchup.

Game 2 was another high, high-level defensive outing for this United team, which really does bode well for the remainder of their series. The run the team went on to start the third quarter was signature United: being extremely disruptive defensively, which led to good looks on the other end. They've had patches of dominance in this series, in both games, which isn't something the JackJumpers have been able to do yet, so United can feel -- and it would be warranted -- like they've clearly been the better team.

"The positive is, that basketball that got us that 15-point lead is in us," Goulding said. "We showed it the other night in Melbourne, we showed it again tonight; it's about: how good is your bad?"

Goulding was still able to find his, Ili seemed unstoppable -- especially in transition; he finished with 20 points in less than 25 minutes -- while Dellavedova and Luke Travers missed good looks all night. The processes seemed largely fine for United; it's just, after blowing that double-digit lead in front of a raucous crowd like the one in MyState Bank Arena, it's easy for the pressure to build and for confidence to tighten.

There's still reason to trust the experience on this United team, and what they've shown on both ends for the majority of this series thus far, going into Sunday's Game 3 and beyond.

Will the shenanigans -- on both sides -- stop?

There's gamesmanship on both sides of this matchup, and it's getting close to overtaking what's generally been high level basketball.

It's the flopping, the acting, the non-basketball stuff. The officials are falling for a lot of it so, in some ways, you can't blame these guys for continuing to embellish things, but it's distracting and not really what anyone wants to see in these high-intensity playoff games.

We've had some games over the course of the 2023-24 NBL season that had bulk flailing -- a Taipans-Phoenix contest comes to mind; you all know why -- but this Game 2 was up there. It then makes these games more about weird personal back-and-forths and who can fool the officials, as opposed to the matchups and physical battles, which is the actual reason why people love watching basketball at this time of year.

"The 'non-basketball stuff'," Goulding said, repeating the question asked of him.

"We've just gotta be better. It's on everyone, individually, to understand what's happening and not buy into it, not get caught up into it, not retaliate, and just stay locked in to us. We've gotta be better at that, obviously."

To be clear, this is something both teams look guilty of; here's hoping the remainder of the series is focused on the battle at hand, as opposed to trying to one-up each other with petty back-and-forths.