Tara Murray
Wyndham will have to make the Big V men’s championship grand final the hard way, after losing to the Hume City Broncos on Saturday night.
After a week off in the first week of the finals, Wyndham faced the Broncos for the first spot in the grand final.
The Broncos jumped out of the blocks and led 8-0, before Wyndham took control and led throughout the rest of the rest quarter and the next two quarters.
The Broncos started to take control of the game late in the third quarter and finally hit the lead again with 5.11 left on the clock in the final quarter.
From there it was all the Broncos with a 29-11 final quarter, as they came away with a 93-82 win.
Wyndham coach Lucas Allen was disappointed after the game, knowing they had enough opportunities to come away with the win.
“I think Hume came to play to start with for sure that is part of their DNA how hard they come out,” he said.
“Ultimately us not shooting the ball well and then hitting some tough shots at the right times, made the biggest difference in the game.”
Allen said after they settled into the game they played a good second quarter especially with Kavione Green in foul trouble and having to head to the bench.
He said the difference in the game was the third quarter which the Broncos won, 23-19.
“Hume took control of the game and we didn’t recover from that and it went from there,” he said.
“It’s simple to say they made shots and we didn’t, but there’s a bit more than that.
“We need to do a better job of getting more good looks, but we definitely got enough good looks.
“We should have still won the game I feel, not taking anything away from Hume but we got the looks.”
Maurice Howard top scored with 20 points, playing all 40 minutes. Five players scored double figures for Wyndham.
Having finished top, Wyndham gets the double chance and will face the McKinnon Cougars on Saturday night in the preliminary final. The Cougars ended the Sunbury Jets run on Saturday night.
Allen said they were determined to get into the grand final and kept alive the dream of back-to-back premierships.
“The beauty of finishing top three everyone gets a second chance,” he said. “We’re definitely going to take that and regroup tomorrow [Sunday] or Monday hopefully take care of them [McKinnon] and meet Hume again.”
It was a tough night all round for Wyndham, with its youth league men’s division 1 side losing the grand final to the Broncos.
The Broncos took the lead early in the first half before Wyndham showed some resistance in the third quarter to reduce the margin to four points at the final break.
The Broncos finished the stronger of the teams to come away with a 91-76 win and the championship.
