City’s Heat cooled by Netblacks

LAST night’s action in the M League saw the City Heat’s undefeated run come to a spectacular end, well beaten by the Netblacks 57-51.

The second quarter was where all the damage was done, as the Netblacks grew a lead and never gave it back.

However, the clash began as evenly as it possibly could, with both sides trading goals for the opening few minutes.

A costly mistake from the Netblacks’ shooters ensured that it was the Heat who were first to break a centre pass.

They built a two-goal lead, but it did not take long for the Netblacks to level things up, and as the quarter drew to a close found themselves with a small lead.

Junior Levi and Asalele Alefaio in particular were impressive for the Netblacks, as they took a four-goal lead into the first change.

The Netblacks came out firing in the second quarter, and all of a sudden raced out to as much as an eight-goal buffer.

Despite the best efforts of Jake Noonan, the Netblacks were not letting the Heat back in the match, and really using Levi’s height advantage to their advantage to grow their lead even further. Alastair Punshon was trying his hardest to match it with Levi, but just could not do it.

As the sides went into the main break, the Netblack lead had grown out to 13 goals.

Things did not get any easier for the Heat, as the Netblacks did not give their opponents an inch of wiggle room to try and eat into the deficit.

Josh Byron was moved onto Levi to try and quell the star shooter’s influence, but despite some excellent height and intercept attempts, not even Noonan could completely shut down Levi.

City Heat did make a slight dent in the lead as the quarter as the quarter came to an end, including a brilliant shot in mid air from Punshon, the Netblack lead was still nine goals as the teams turned for home.

The Netblacks continued to pile the pain on the Heat in the final quarter, as Jesse Failla and Cameron Powell in particular were really using lob passes up to Levi to great effect, and the partnership between Powell and Levi was working really well.

The final term was a mere formality for the Netblacks, and although the Heat did make a dint in the lead, the Netblacks still recorded a pretty comfortable six-goal win.

Meanwhile in other results, a good start from the Altona Falcons helped guide them to a 36 goal lead over Boroondara Thunder, while the Ariels had a nine goal win over Darebin after only leading by one at the first break.

M-LEAGUE PREMIER MEN’S ROUND 10 RESULTS:

Altona Falcons (77) defeated Boroondara Thunder (41)
Netblacks (57) defeated City Heat (51)
Ariels (53) defeated Darebin (44)

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