Basketball New Zealand

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Saints forward Arthur Trousdell (Photosport)

Between their one-point upset win over the CPS Nelson Giants last Thursday and their home opener on Sunday, the Century City Wellington Saints will have had 10 days to work on their game.

“I think it could work either way,” said Doug Marty, the Saints first-year coach in the Dominion Finance NBL.

“I think it will be a benefit because we have more time to work on our sets and our chemistry. The challenge is to say fresh and we’ve been scrimmaging to do that. I’d say it’s a positive ahead of our first home game.”

The Saints (2-2) welcome the Marley Canterbury Rams (1-2) to TSB Bank Arena on The Capital’s waterfront on Sunday afternoon to complete the Easter round, confident on the back of their win at Nelson, rallying from eight points down at halftime.

Rebounding – especially protecting their defensive boards – was an area exposed by taller opponents in loses to the Appliance Shed Harbour Heat and Devon Dynamos Taranaki that saw them start 1-2, and an area Marty has been correcting at trainings the last two weeks.

It worked in round three, Nick Horvath pulling down a season-high 14 rebounds and Arthur Trousdell six as the Saints out-rebounding the bigger Giants 38-34, igniting their third quarter comeback.

“We have made a lot of progress in some important areas, especially defensive rebounding. We did some good things in the last game in our techniques and execution but how deep are the roots, you know?

“We showed something but can we do it two games in a row? Can we be consistent on the boards and can we be tough?”

The Saints will need that toughness down-low against the tenacious Rams, who have five players standing 2m-plus, including New Zealand Breakers development player Mike Townsend and American import Joey Harrell.

“We’re really looking forward to it,” Marty said.

“We’ve had four games on the road now and we want to show our home fans that we’re a good team, a team they can get behind and a team they can be proud of.”

The Saints lose American centre Horvath, who is averaging 21.5 points and 9.3 rebounds per game, after Sunday, taking a five-week break to wed his former Kiwi hockey international fiance, Sheree Phillips, and travel around New Zealand with visiting family.

Horvath and the Saints hope his New Zealand citizenship application will be approved during the break, enabling him to rejoin Wellington as a non-restricted player, in turn allowing Marty to keep both Marquis Webb and Horvath’s replacement-in-waiting, American Kevin Owens.

Webb has averaged 18.3 points per game but has struggled for consistency, scoring 48 points in their two wins but just 25 points in the two losses.

Marty does have the option of teaming Owens with Horvath in the front-court on Sunday and leaving Webb off the playing roster, but with point guard Luke Martin injuring his ankle mid-week and Webb able to cover the ball handling duties, he said he would stick with his original import pairing.

Once Horvath departs, Marty was confident Owens – a 2.09m centre who played for the Cairns Taipains in the Australian NBL in 2006-07 and arrived in Wellington last Wednesday – could step into the vacant spot without too much disruption.

“We’ll probably have to modify a few things because everyone has different strengths.

“It should be a smooth transition because he’s been training with us for a week now and he’s a big centre, a banger, like Nick is. They both run the court well and rebound well and have a presence on defence. We won’t know until we get out there in games. They’re different though, Nick can face-up his defender while Kevin is more of a back-to-the-basket guy.”

The Saints still have former Tall Black Brendon Polyblank to return from Switzerland next month and possibly Mike Tompson, who still awaits a surgery date on his injured knee, followed by four weeks recovery.

NBL Round Four Guide (1.4MB pdf)