Phoenix Fall To Kings

The Phoenix fell agonisingly short of victory in a must-win game, going down to the Kings at home 91-89.

In a sloppy first quarter, neither team took the ascendency, and it ended with the Kings leading 23-22.

The second quarter produced much of the same, with the Phoenix struggling to find their groove.

Offensively for the Phoenix, point guard Xavier Munford put the team on his back with 17 first-half points, helping the home team enter the main break leading 50-48.

A slow start to the third saw the Kings turn a two-point deficit into a 7 point lead, and in the blink of an eye, the Phoenix were in a hole.

They dug their way out to close to within two but almost immediately found themselves back in the same seven-point hole; a big bucket from Creek and a three-point play from Le'afa saw the Phoenix close to within two with two minutes left. 

The rest of the quarter was a back and forth affair, with the Kings building a five-point lead before the Phoenix closed to within three at the buzzer, trailing  70-67.

The final quarter was a carbon copy of the third, the Phoenix giving up a lead and working their way back into the game time and time again, before the effort of clawing their way back became too much. As the final buzzer sounded, the Kings had eeked out a two-point win.

The Result

Kings 91 Phoenix 89

The Numbers

Phoenix
Xavier Munford 26 points, 4 rebounds, 5 assists
Zhou Qi 12 points, 7 rebounds
Brandon Ashley 13 points, 7 rebounds

Kings
Jarrell Martin 24 points, 8 rebounds.

The Turning Point

Late in the game with the chance to take the lead Mitch Creek got off a shot that nine times out of ten he makes, it bounced out and that was the game. 

The Player of the Game

Xavier Munford was the shining light for then Phoenix dropping 26 points 4 rebounds and 5 assists, he kept the Phoenix in the game in the first half with 17 points, and it was Munford who took over late to give the Phoenix the chance in then last quarter.

The Play of the Game

With the Phoenix down by 4, Xavier Munford went to town, hitting a huge step back three to cut the margin to 1.

From the Coach
"There was some improvement from our game in Illawarra, but we need to get much better if we want to make finals and then make some noise in the finals. We were 11-5 and second on the ladder and people were talking us up but internally we weren't particularly happy with the way we were performing. And there hasn’t been a whole lot change, we're still failing in the same areas," -Simon Mitchell.

From the Player

"The mood is not too bad, we are disappointed, but we come in every day with energy, we have guys willing to do the little things. At the moment we're a little off beat, we need to get back to that little bit of pop, little bit of zest in our game. Simon touched on it before the game we have to get back to that edge we had, we haven’t had that for probably the last eight games." -Mitch Creek

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Phoenix Media (19/3/22)