June 13: St Laurence Geelong Supercats 127 (N. Herbert 40, D. George 21, C. Lee 15) defeated Dandenong Rangers 110 (D. Jura 40, G. Illangakoon 18, B. Hobba 12) at the Arena.

June 14: St Laurence Geelong Supercats 113 (N. Herbert 30, I. Muhammad 29, C. Lee 16) defeated Knox Raiders 111 (L. Strong 26, C.J. Massingale 22, M. Hill 20) at Knox Converse Stadium.

St. Laurence Geelong Supercats head coach Mark Leader was confident his team will see play-off action for the 12th year in a row and the 8th straight year under his stewardship following two solid wins on the weekend. The Supercats dominated the home contest at the Arena on Saturday before travelling to Knox for a hard fought win on Sunday afternoon. The club's 13th win for the season places them four games clear of nearest rival Sandringham and seven games clear of dropping out of finals contention with only eight games of the regular season to play.

On Saturday night the team showed the form worthy of the finals as they comprehensively defeated the Dandenong Rangers at the Arena.

Dandenong did not hit the lead at any point in the game as Daniel George landed the first points of the night and Nathan Herbert followed that up with the first of six three-pointers to set the tone for the night. With Braith Cox unable to play with a back injury, the point guard duties for the night fell to 150 gamer Nick Owusu who relished the opportunity to spend extra minutes guiding his team in offence.

Geelong raced away to a 40 to 23 point quarter time lead on the back of 19 individual points from Herbert. The second quarter was far more even and, whilst Herbert scored 25 points for the half in front of some very interested NBL visitors, veteran Dusty Jura was doing his best to keep the Rangers in it as the margin was maintained at 17 points at half time.

George and Clifton Lee worked with Herbert to pour on even more points in the third as the Rangers disintegrated with first Jonathan Sheppard and then Matt Witherden earning technical fouls after comments to the referee. In Witherden’s case a double technical was issued following a foul on Geelong’s Chris Dunlop earning the Dandenong number 20 an early shower. Geelong made 4 of the resulting six free throws to top the ton with a minute to play in the period to lead 102 to 78 at the last break.

With Owusu continuing to lead and score well in his 150th club game, Geelong increased their margin to a massive 30 points in the last quarter before coach Mark Leader rested his starters for Sunday’s clash up at Knox and ran the bench for the last five minutes. The Supercats ran out the easiest of victors 127 to 110.

Herbert finished the match with 40 points for Geelong after resting the last 8 minutes of the game. George had one of his best games to date for the club with 21 points and 12 rebounds while Lee had 15 and Owusu 14. Jura matched Herbert’s 40 points for the visitors.

Geelong headed up the highway to meet Knox on Sunday afternoon and immediately raced out of the blocks with Herbert and Muhammad leading the early scoring to be at one stage 18 to 2 before Knox steadied to be down 32 to 27 at quarter time.

Clifton Lee’s 3 pointer took Geelong out to a nine point lead in the second but the Knox import combination of Lester Strong and CJ Massingale had the home side back in the competition at one point levelling the scores before Geelong drew away to a three point lead at the half.

The third quarter went basket for basket as first one team then the other gained the accendency. Knox took the lead for the briefest of moments before Herbert’s 3 pointer put Geelong back in front by two points at three quarter time.

The last quarter was enthralling as the teams again went basket for basket until the Supercats opened up an 8 point margin with 5 minutes to play. Extending the lead to 10 with just under three minutes to play, the Raiders fought on bravely and chipped away to even the scores with 20 seconds on the clock. After Mark Leader called a time out, Muhammad was substituted in with 9 seconds to play and dribbled down in traffic to put up the winning basket with just three seconds to spare.

In another terrific game Herbert had 30 points for Geelong to average 35 for the weekend and surely to be in contention for the Player of the week award. Muhammad had a great outing with 29 while Lee was consistent with 16. Strong was the best for the Raiders with 26.

The Supercats return to the Arena next Saturday to take on the Nunawading Spectres at 7:30 pm. The Supercats will go into that game without Nathan Herbert who will be on National duty at the Australian Boomers camp.

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