Tara Murray
Altona Gators’ Big V men’s division 1 season came to an end as the Whittlesea Pacers put on a show on Saturday night.
Having won their first final, the Gators came up against a side they knew well in the semi finals, the Whittlesea Pacers.
Having played a number of close games in the past two seasons including last season’s division 2 grand final, it would have been no surprise to anyone if it was another close one.
The Pacers though had other ideas and blew the game open in the first quarter, leading 42-22 at the first break.
The margin proved to be too much and blew out in the second half with the Pacers winning 125-85.
Gators coach Josh Turton said they came across a side that had come to play. The Pacers missed their first shot before hitting their next 14.
“They are an unbelievable team,” he said. “To that first hand was tough as the opposition, while as a basketball enthusiast it was cool to see.”
Turton said while they didn’t want to take anything away from the Pacers, they didn’t defend as well as they would have liked.
He said at quarter time they didn’t think that the game was over.
“We were still pretty confident,” he said. “There’s quite a few times we’ve played them and we haven’t been great in our first quarters.
“We spoke about staying in control and not getting overwhelmed. We wanted to try and get to spots where we wanted to score.
“The second quarter we started well, but they were pretty much unstoppable. It didn’t matter how we played, they were on track to win.”
Brian Adams and Tyson Burton top scored with 20 points each in the loss.
Turton said they probably over-achieved in their first season back up in division 1.
“We were happy to be there,” he said. “They were coming off a game they should have won.
“The main talking point for us before the season was to continue building and rebuilding the culture.
“Making finals was a bonus.
“We don’t have the big budget as other teams and have a negative budget with players having to pay fees.
“There’s such a good culture and we have achieved so much in the last two years which is fantastic.”
Turton said they would have a break before thinking what was next. He said they rushed back into training for this season.
“We’ll enjoy the time off and relax a little bit.”
