William Stewart lines up a shot on his way to a game-high 28 points against Albury. Photos: Wayne Herring.
Seymour is once again off to the Country Basketball League North East Men’s decider, punching its ticket to the big dance following a semi-final rout of Albury at Seymour Sports and Aquatic Centre at the weekend.
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Having last year bowed out at the semi-final stage, bringing an end to a run of three straight titles, the Blasters will once again feature on the final day of the season this year as they hunt for a 10th CBL North East Men’s title, much to the delight of coach Craig Hockley.
“It’s been really good, a really good season, and it’s reward for our effort only losing the one game. So yeah, I'm really looking forward to another grand final, which is great,” he said.
Jesse Brock completes an easy lay-up in Seymour’s big win over Albury.
While the Blasters have looked to be the form team all season, securing the minor premiership with a 9-1 record, it hasn’t exactly been smooth sailing, with plenty of disruption to the line-up from last year taking some time to smooth out.
However, Hockley has his team firing at the right time of the year.
“We started with a pretty new group this year, I think we had to change around six or seven players from last year,” he said.
“We had a couple of older players come back in that missed out last year because of injury, and so we've had a bit of a mixture of experience and youth.
“Then just gelling them together — we've had ups and downs, some games have been good, some haven't been, but I think we're gelling together at the right time of the season.”
Judging by Saturday’s semi-final result, Hockley’s assertion that his team is playing its best basketball when it matters is accurate, with Seymour claiming a stunning 96-53 victory over the Cougars to book a return to the CBL decider.
Harry Stones was instrumental in Seymour’s win over Albury at the weekend, with the Blasters set to enjoy home court advantage in the decider against Wallan.
It was a victory built on the Blasters’ trademark aggression on the defensive end, a point of pride for the Seymour side, which conceded just 25 points in the opening half to essentially put the game to bed by the main break, entering the huddle with a 24-point advantage.
“I think our first quarter, we really hit them hard defensively, and that's what we pride ourselves on, defence, keeping teams down to a low score,” Hockley said of his side’s semi-final performance.
“We did that early on and then they just couldn't break our shackles and we were scoring pretty easily, and at a high percentage too, so we really just broke them in that first quarter and a bit.”
A 28-point performance from William Stewart led everyone on the court, with solid support from Harry Stones (18 points), Tyler Best (13 points) and Robbie Sartori (12 points) boding well ahead of the grand final showdown with Wallan on Saturday at Seymour Sports and Aquatic Centre.
The Blasters and the Panthers split the two regular season meetings one-all, although Seymour is slightly in front on aggregate scores, outscoring Wallan 148 to 141 in the two matches.
Hockley isn’t expecting anything different come Saturday, noting the two sides have faced off in numerous big games in recent times, and predicts the decider will be another classic contest.
“We’ve had some really good games against Wallan over the last three or four years, so we expect another tough, tough game, and it can go either way,” he said.
“But we sort of know their players, they know our players as well, as we’ve played each other a number of times. But I don't think there'll be anything new thrown at us and we won't be throwing anything new at them.”
Ahead of the final training session before the big dance, the Blasters’ mentor said his side would be focusing on the structure and system that had got it into a position to challenge for the title on Saturday night.
“We’ll be just concentrating on what we do best and sticking to our structure and belief in our systems and making sure that our defence is really played aggressively,” Hockley said.
“As I said before, playing good defence, our defence, will go a long way to winning games, so that’s what we’ll be doing and concentrating on this weekend.”
Robbie Sartori notched double-digits against Albury, pouring in 12 points as the Blasters booked their spot in the grand final.
While Seymour’s men’s side has progressed to the grand final, it was heartbreak for the women, going down by 48 points in their semi-final, 27-75, at the hands of minor premier Albury at Lauren Jackson Sports Centre in Albury on Saturday evening.
Seymour Sports and Aquatic Centre is set to host both the North East Men’s and North East Women’s deciders on Saturday, with gates open from 4.30pm and a barbecue to run for the duration of the event.
The women’s grand final between Albury Cougars and Wodonga Wolves will begin proceedings at 5.15pm, while the men’s grand final between Seymour Blasters and Wallan Panthers is scheduled for tip-off at 8pm.
The Country Basketball League grand final is a ticketed event with limited seating. However, a number of general admission standing areas are available throughout the stadium.
