Preview: NBL25 R12 Away v Sydney Kings

The Brisbane Bullets continued their impressive NBL momentum with a win at home on Thursday night and now will look to keep it going on the road to the Sydney Kings on Sunday afternoon.

The Bullets have now won their last three games in NBL25 and have done it in style over the past week with the victories against the Adelaide 36ers, Melbourne United and South East Melbourne Phoenix.

Across those three games the Bullets have scored an average of 113.3 points while shooting at a phenomenal 59.7 per cent from the field along with 47.3 per cent from behind the three-point arc.

There have been plenty of players stepping up too in the winning run with Keandre Cook averaging 22.7 points, 4.3 rebounds and 3.3 assists, James Batemon 17.0 points and 3.0 assists, and Casey Prather 25.3 points and 6.0 rebounds.

Then there's Tyrell Harrison delivering 22.3 points and 12.0 rebounds, and captain Mitch Norton 11.7 points and 3.3 assists as well with Tohi Smith-Milner, Emmett Naar and Isaac White making important contributions too.

On the back of a brilliant performance back on Sunday to beat United in Melbourne 122-114 with Prather, Batemon, Cook and Harrison all scoring 25 or more points, the Bullets backed it up at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre on Thursday.

Despite falling 15 points behind the Phoenix early in the second half, Brisbane outscored them from there 68 points to 45 the rest of the way for the 116-108 win to now improve to a 7-7 record on the back of winning three in-a-row for the first time in NBL25.

Now the Bullets try to make it four straight but it won't be easy against a Kings team who entered the season as raging championship favourites and who are sitting in third place at 9-7.

Sydney will be fresh for Sunday's match up as well having not played since a big win over the New Zealand Breakers last Saturday and also having a good recent record over the Bullets.

While Brisbane won the last meeting between the two teams of NBL24, prior to that Sydney had won seven straight by an average of 17.4 points and then also won the first meeting of NBL25.

The Kings came to Brisbane and built a 29-point lead before the Bullets did score the game's last 16 points to cut the final margin back to just nine points back on October 5.

Bullets coach Justin Schueller knows the challenge that a team coached by Brian Goorjian and who features for MVP's Xavier Cooks and Jaylen Adams along with Cam Oliver, Alex Toohey, Bul Kuol and Kouat Noi presents.

However, his focus continues on doing what he can to get his Bullets firing completely the way he wants and that has an especially big focus on working on things defensively.

"Honestly it's about us and we'll always look at what the opposition is doing, but we'll really focus on where we were great and where we weren’t in this game," Schueller said.

"To us we're still in this growth point and we know if we have our consistency with who we want to be at both ends of the floor, it puts us in a position to win any game.

"Going into Sydney, it's a tough arena and the first time there for some of our guys, but it's a great opportunity to get some lessons learned and to keep on growing. That's the thing that I'm looking forward to most."

Bullets guard James Batemon hasn’t forgotten what happened last time against the Kings and is confident of earning a measure of revenge come Sunday afternoon.

"They was the team that came into our home and embarrassed us in front of our home crowd so we're excited to have the opportunity to go back and try to correct the mistakes that we made in that first game," Batemon said.

"They came out and punked us right away from the start and even though we made an effort towards the end, we know we've got to start better against a group like that.

"They're a very talented group and I'm excited for the challenge and it's something that we get a chance to do for the first time this year which is win four in-a-row. We're excited to do it and we think we are going to get it done."

GAME INFO

Who: Brisbane Bullets vs Sydney Kings

Tip off: 3:30pm (AEST), Sunday 15 December, 2024

Where: Qudos Bank Arena, Sydney

Watch: 10 Peach, 10 Play, ESPN via Foxtel and Kayo