(Courtesy Norwood Basketball Club)

Norwood have washed the bitter taste of defeat from their mouths with a 122-74 thumping of the Eastern Mavericks at MARS on Saturday night.

The final scoreline would come as no surprise to most in the Central ABA, with the hapless Mavs ravaged by injury and circumstance, and with only one win for the season so far, but the Flames struggled early. Eastern executed well early, with Phil Modra finding easy baskets for Shane Breheny on almost every possession. The Flames’ highly-touted defence was made to look disorganised and ragged, with a string of easy baskets. Breheny finished the quarter with 18 of his team’s 21 points. Eastern was unable to find a defensive stop, though, and Norwood lead by nine at the first break.

In the second quarter, the Flames must adjustments on defence, held Breheny scoreless and increased their lead to 22 at the half. More of the same in the second half saw the lead increase to 30 at the final break and blow out to 48 at the end.

After his fast start, Shane Breheny finished with 24 points to be the game’s high-scorer, and also collected eight rebounds in a gallant effort. After dropping 30 points against Norwood in round three, Phil Modra was well-held (two points), but still had an impact offensively with 11 assists. Will Smith (13), and Cameron Myles (12) were the only other Mavs in double figures, while ex-Norwood junior Ben Dearman collected 10 rebounds.

For the Flames, Dan Thompson had no physical match on his way to 14 points and 17 rebounds, and David Cooper also had his way with a team-high 20 points and 11 boards. Todd Matthews went 8-13 for his 18 points, and Andrew Webber locked his radar in with six three-pointers and eight assists. Keith Krause was efficient for his 13 points in 18 minutes.

The greatest difference, eventually, was size. The Flames were simply too big for the Mavs, winning the rebounding 70-45. Perimeter shooting still remains a concern for the Flames, who, without Andrew Webber’s performance (6-11), went 4-23 from 3pt territory.