JackJumpers finally get a chance to take stock

A tough run on the road to start NBL26 caught up with the Tasmania JackJumpers on Friday night but coach Scott Roth is proud of his group to be sitting at 4-3 as they can finally have some time to take stock this week.

The JackJumpers knew they had a gruelling start to the NBL season with seven of the opening nine matches on the road, but the toll does start to take greater effect when you have two games in less than 48 hours.

Tasmania produced a standout performance back at MyState Bank Arena for just the second time this season last Wednesday night against the Sydney Kings where they came out victorious 86-70.

The reward for that was jumping on a flight to Auckland on Thursday to play a fresh Breakers outfit on their home floor on Friday with the JackJumpers also having Anthony Drmic join Majok Deng, David Johnson and Archie Woodhill on the sidelines.

It all caught up with the JackJumpers in the finish with the Breakers scoring the 82-65 victory, but in the big picture for his team to be 4-3 after the opening seven matches with five of those on the road and coach Roth can't be anything but happy.

"I'd be lying to you if I said I thought we'd be sitting here 4-3 with the travel schedule that we've concurred," Roth said.

"It's not quite over yet with seven of our first nine on the road and we're not really done with that phase yet, and then obviously multiple teams are going through injuries and we're in our injury mode also right now.

"To be sitting 4-3 with what we've gone through has been a really good sign of our guys and the work they're putting in."

The JackJumpers now don't play again until Sunday when they are back on the road to the Kings and Roth is relieved for his players that they do now get some time to freshen up and to work on some things with a full week back at home.

There is the hope that Drmic, Woodhill, Deng and Johnson will be getting close to a return as well, but Roth knows it's just the calm before another storm with when they have two home games in quick succession to Perth and Cairns after playing in Sydney on Sunday.

"We're missing four and when they're back, they're back, and I'm not the medical doctor on that side of things, but we're hopeful of having all of them back before the FIBA break," Roth said.

"These guys deserve it (time in between games) and they've been road warriors here, and the schedule is the schedule and you have to show up to play, but we need some time for some practice days and to also get some rest.

"I think it will be good across the board and we'll see how our guys are mending over the course of the week. Ultimately we have to do better in some areas and there's a lot of room for growth for us."

Going back to last Wednesday night in the win over the Kings at home and the JackJumpers were outstanding in all the effort areas with 48 rebounds to 38 including 13-6 at the offensive end which meant they took 10 extra shots and went on to score the 16-point win.

With Drmic going out of the line-up with a back complaint and then the lightning quick turnaround to play the Breakers on Friday, the same energy level wasn’t quite on show with the Breakers winning the rebound count by 14, having juts turnovers and taking 25 extra shots than Tasmania.

Roth just felt that things caught up with his team given the rough schedule and short turnaround combined with missing big bodies including Deng and Woodhill which meant the burden as big men to carry for Will Magnay and Josh Bannan was a bit much.

While he knows that losing in the effort areas like that will always make it tough to win, it was as much down to the tough circumstances as anything.

"Scoring 82 points can be a winnable score but when you give up 19 offensive rebounds it's pretty hard to do anything," Roth said.

"Until you can rebound the ball consistently, when you are getting stops but giving up second chance opportunities there's not much you can do. That was the theme throughout the entire game and that's what we were harping on to try and fix.

"We didn’t compete on that side of the ball well enough to give ourselves a good enough chance and I think that's happened twice to us now, and we will just watch some film when we get back and try to fix it up."