Saturday night’s heart-breaking overtime loss to league-leaders Adelaide has left the Bendigo Bank Spirit’s WNBL play-offs hopes hinging on the final two matches of the season.
Heading into the game with an 0-2 record against the Lightning this season, the Spirit matched Adelaide all the way in a high-quality and physical encounter, only to be outplayed in five minutes of overtime to go down 97-87 at Bendigo Stadium.
Results from other WNBL matches went Bendigo’s way, but the Spirit now finds itself in sixth position with upcoming games against Sydney and Logan to decide whether it will make the play-offs.
In front of one of the biggest and most vocal home crowds for the season, the Spirit came desperately close to beating Adelaide, with the scores locked at 82-all in the dying seconds of regular time.
Star point guard Kristi Harrower, so often the match-winner for the Spirit, took the lead in a time-out to plan Bendigo’s final offensive play.
It almost worked to perfection.
At the top of the key, Gabrielle Richards set the screen for Harrower, who swivelled onto a jump-shot at the free-throw line, only for her shot to rim out and the match went into overtime.
From there the Spirit’s shooting accuracy went missing, with Adelaide’s star centre Suzy Batkovic proving why she is the league’s dominant player by contributing three points, an assist, four rebounds and also drawing two fouls when the game was on the line.
Australian Opal Batkovic finished the match with 26 points, 13 rebounds and five assists and she was well-supported by Angela Marino and Jo Hill, who scored 21 and 20 points respectively.
Harrower was the game’s top scorer with 28 points, while she also dished out eight assists and collected four rebounds.
The Spirit’s Tess Madgen and Gabrielle Richards performed admirably with both players draining 18 points, while Madgen also hauled in 11 rebounds.
The highly-charged encounter featured more than 50 fouls and 21 lead changes as both teams wrestled – sometimes literally – for momentum.
Spirit coach Bernie Harrower said his team had its chances, but was not as clinical as Adelaide.
“We had our opportunities, but we let ourselves down in the one percenters,” Harrower said.
“I was really disappointed because in the first half we gave up far too many offensive rebounds and our defence wasn’t where it was the last couple of weeks.
“I was really disappointed with the foul count and disappointed with the inconsistency of the refereeing. Some of the stuff we were getting fouls for we couldn’t get at our end.” But Harrower was pleased with the way the players stood toe-to-toe with the best team in the league.
He said the Spirit needed to bring the same resolve to the final two matches – starting with Sydney on Saturday night.
“If we can play like we did against Adelaide (we can win) – we went within a rimmed shot of winning,” Harrower said.
“There’s no margin for error, we have to win these last two home games – if we don’t we’re pretty much out of it.
“For us it’s win or go home.”
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