Sandra’ JT’ Sully here, and trust me, these events were so long ago, Clint Eastwood is probably directing and starring in a film about them.

Max Duffy Winning the Ray Guy Award

Amazing scenes in the long lost city of Atlanta (Or is it Atlantis?), as the man not considered good enough for Ross Lyon’s low standards has now been confirmed as being better than thousands of assorted Americans.

It’s an amazing streak that Aussies have with the Ray Guy Award – When you count back to Tom Hornsey winning the award in 2013, 6 of the last 7 winners of College Football’s major punting award are Antipodeans – Tom Hackett won it twice punting for Utah, Mitch Wishnowsky succeeded him at the Utes and won it in 2016, followed by Michael Dickson, and now Max!

But, while Max taking out the Ray Guy was a fait accompli, I was looking for something on the ESPN telecast more pertinent to my Bowls reports.

DUFF MADE IT ON TO ESPN!

Just think Duff – You missed out on a $33 share for finishing 4th in the Twilight Bowls just to watch your own son experience the greatest achievement of his sporting career, and possibly his life.

Still, someone I know making it on to the former worldwide sports leader…. It’s the Perth equivalent of being the mutual acquaintance of the Apollo 11 astronauts.

NBL: Round 11

Thursday

Perth Wildcats 88 defeated Cairns Taipans @ The Snake Pit

After being rolled twice by The Snakes already in 2019/20, the Cats, in Trevor Gleeson’s 400th game as coach, somehow did to Cairns what Cairns did to them quite successfully in both matchups – Run their arses over in the final quarter, putting an end to the Taipans’ brief little period living in Shangri-La.

The Snakes led 69-63 with a quarter to play, but the Cats started the quarter with a 9-0 run, and after regaining the lead thanks to a pair of free throws to Damien Martin, Terrico White drained a monster 3 with 1:49 to play to make the scores 82-78 to the Cats.

Kouat Noi hit a 3 with 5 seconds to go to close it to 86-84, but Cotton drained both free throws after a quick foul, beheading the Snakes and finishing the night with a game-high 24 points, giving the Wildcats 3 straight wins.

Outside of Cotton, White bagged 21, and Kay had 19 points, 11 rebounds, five assists and a pair of blocks and steals, while for the hosts, Oliver led the home side with a standout 21 points and 17 rebounds, DJ Newbill scored 17, and Scott Machado recorded a 13-and-12 double-double.

Friday

Adelaide 36ers 113 defeated SEM Phoenix 111 @ Adelaide Arena

Mitch Creek made his return to the 36ers faithful, and thanks to a 27 point and 11 rebound performance, the fans went absolutely wild…

When he narrowly missed the driving layup that would’ve sent the game to overtime.

Saturday

Sydney Kings 104 defeated Melbourne United 81 @ Melbourne Arena

It promised to be a massive contest between 2 of the heavyweights of the NBL, and it certainly was…. if you’re a Kings fan, or you have an obsessive hatred for Melbourne.

Perth Wildcats 86 defeated Brisbane Bullets 78 @ Perth Arena

Damien Martin reached his glorious 300th game, which was rightfully celebrated by all and sundry, although Marto’s output for the night would resemble this.

A big fat doughnut in the points column for Marto, but he made up for it by directing the traffic and leading the Cats to victory.

That’s now 4 straight wins for the Cats in the space of about 9 days, and at this stage, they’re an outright 2nd on the table.

Sunday – The Point Gods

Adelaide 36ers 99 defeated New Zealand Breakers 96 @ Auckland Arena

I only need to say 2 words about this game.

JEROME. RANDLE.

SEM Phoenix 112 defeated Cairns Taipans 105 in OT @ The Firepit

JEBUS MARY AND JOSEPH, JOHN ROBERSON.

For context, Roberson had 11 points through 31 minutes, as the Taipans led by 10 points and looked home for all money…

… only for the import to end the game scoring 21 POINTS IN 6 MINUTES OF GAMETIME.

It was so utterly incredible that there was a point in OT where he’d scored 21 of the last 23 points of the game.

Forget about the worst bushfires in Australian history, the fireys should be trying to extinguish the out of control Robbo burning through Melbourne Arena!

It wasn’t like the Taipans played poorly, after all, they did score 105 points – The only problem was that they were playing against someone being used as a host body for one of Michael Jordan’s demonic rituals.

As they say in Balga, that was ridonculous.

Monday

Melbourne 94 defeated Illawarra 73 @ WIN SEC

Back to regular programming for United, who did exactly what they were expected to do and beat up on an undermanned Hawks team.

Really, that was it.

Australian NBA Watch

While Ben Simmons is off doing nothing of note and driving the ESPN Talking Heads up the wall with his apparent under performing, Patty Mills and the Spurs played in 4 consecutive overtime games (Winning 3), the last of which came on Saturday evening, against Aron Baynes and the Phoenix Suns in Mexico City.

With 8.6 seconds left, the Suns led 119-117, but on an inbound pass, Demar Derozan drove to the basket and scored an utterly unbelievable shot that floated in while being fouled , but he would miss the And-1 attempt, but the rebound was ruled out of bounds off the Suns with 3.8 seconds to go.

Gregg Popvich drew up a play – Derrick White had the inbound, which he passed to LaMarcus Aldridge in front of the San Antonio bench, Mills got the ball and the screen from Aldridge, dribbled to mid-range, and the shot was nothing but net with 0.3 to go.

Mills finished with 26 points on 6-for-14 shooting from 3, and that game-winner somewhat overshadowed another great play he made in OT – With 1:17 left and the Suns leading 114-113, Mills had the ball stolen by Suns guard Ricky Rubio, only for Mills to show that classic scrappy Australian hustle, steal the ball back from the Spaniard, charge up the court and drain the triple to put the Spurs ahead 116-114.

Alongside taking advantage of the Rockets having a cry about a bucket being waved off, that might be the highlight of their season.

(V)A(R)-League: Round 10

Western United 2 defeated Brisbane Roar 0 @ Suncorp Stadium

Not content with causing nightmares for one of his former teams, Beshart Berisha decided to come back to haunt the Roar, in a game in which the only talking point was Mark Rudan and Robbie Fowler not shaking hands, which led to Rudan having a civil chat to Brisbane CEO David Pourre about Fowler blowing him off in the same manner that used blow off lines of white powder in his Liverpool days.

For goodness sake Mark, you won – Do what anyone sane individual would do and mock them.

Melbourne Lack Of Victory 0 drew with Wellington Phoenix 0 @ AAMI Park

It really is saying something about the state of the Victory that they were lucky just to get a point in a scoreless draw.

The hosts were pressing on the Phoenix defence for an hour, until Kiki Dobras (Who was on a yellow) was shown a straight red for what was deemed a reckless high challenge, despite the fact that he actually won the ball, while Cam Devlin came in late and effectively ran into his boot.

Robbie Slater and Mark Bosnich both agreed that it was more careless than reckless, which meant it should have only resulted in a warning – Instead, the VAR somehow sided with the referee, and the decision stood.

So the Vics went a man down, and yada yada yada, the Phoenix did nothing with the numerical advantage, and everyone lived disappointed forever more.

Sydney FC 1 defeated Central Coast Mariners 0 @ Kogarah Oval

For a game between 1st and stone motherless last, the Mariners weren’t totally disgraced, despite going a goal down inside 6 minutes.

Still, they did lose, and the Sky Blues appeared more concerned about re-signing players like Milos Ninkovich than beating their upstate rivals – Still, they are the Sky Blues, so they accomplished both.

Perth Glory 2 defeated WSW 0 @ HBF Park

As several teams splutter along like a Datsun 120Y, the Glory, despite Tony Popvich making the admission that they have players lacking fitness, are starting to consistently play like a team who had such an amazing season in 2018/19, while the Wanderers experienced the empty feeling of losing a match without having the VAR to blame for it.

The Glory managing to win at home for the first time all season, and they got the job done with both of their centre backs scoring – The Swiss Army knife that is Gregory Wuthrich scored after 18 minutes, and Alex Grant doubled the advantage with his left foot from the chaotic remnants of a set piece.

Melbourne City 4 defeated Newcastle Jets 0 @ McDonald Jones Stadium

A week after getting stomped by the Glory at home, City ventured up to the Hunter and made the Jets look like an NSL team, slamming 4 goals past the hosts in an hour to turn the final 1/3 of the match into a leisurely Sunday fitness test.

Jamie MacLaren resumed his goal scoring spree, reaching double figures for the season in just 6 games, setting a new record in the process, while Tom Glover debuted in goal for City, and got off to the best possible start with a clean sheet.

Jeff Horn – Michael Zerafa II

It’s probably going on while I’m writing this report, so here’s a summary of Pretty Boy Zerafa’s comments about Horn this week, in the form of a popular internet meme.

TWO JUDGES THOUGHT OTHERWISE, PRETTY BOY.