Crocs end three-game roadie with win

The Townsville Crocodiles are sick of the sight of each other, but their Australian National Basketball League finals hopes are healthy after they ended a huge road trip by beating the Melbourne Tigers 98-91.

The Crocs overcame the demands of three away games in four days and travel in between to hit a 10-0 streak in the last quarter at Melbourne's State Hockey and Netball Centre on Saturday night, which sealed their sixth win of the season.

The Perth Wildcats top the table after round eight after beating the Cairns Taipans 79-64 on Saturday night, while third-placed Adelaide beat the second-placed Wollongong Hawks 83-76 on Saturday night.

Townsville began the round by beating Cairns in the Taipans' backyard last Wednesday night, yet they let that result slip with a disappointing 93-77 defeat to the Blaze on the Gold Coast last Friday night.

So the game against the Tigers was a crucial one, and Crocs coach Trevor Gleeson was pleased his players defied fatigue to level their record at 6-6 and hold on to fourth spot.

"It's one of the toughest periods for us so we're glad we did a really solid pre-season and got the guys through," Gleeson said on Sunday.

"I was pretty pleased in the last quarter when we came from behind to win the game, it was a great effort by the guys.

"We just had to stay in the fight and we know we've won before on back-to-back games - we played Adelaide then Melbourne and we won last time - so it was in the back of the guys' minds that we can play back-to-back games with travel involved.

"That confidence really shone out in the second half because the big concern as a coach when you've got a short turnaround is that the guys might reduce their intensity because of fatigue.

"But we were able to step up a little bit so it was quite pleasing."

After a big travel leg, Gleeson's rewarded his players with some decent down-time.

"I don't want to see them until Tuesday," he said.

The 36ers proved their worth when they beat the Hawks, with Adam Ballinger (17 points) and import John Gilchrist (15) again prominent, but Wollongong could not get enough support for Mat Campbell's 22 points.

The Wildcats' win over the Taipans improved their record to 7-3 and avenged their 83-74 away defeat to the New Zealand Breakers last Thursday night.

Stephen Weigh finished with 22 points for Perth and Kevin Lisch scored 12, while Julien Mills scored 20 and Dusty Rychart 14 for the Taipans, who missed the presence of captain Phill Jones, who played less than two minutes because he was ill.

The Breakers (5-5) are fifth, the Blaze (5-6) sixth, Cairns' two losses this round left them 4-8 and in seventh spot, ahead of the Tigers (3-7), who at least had new import Julius Hodge impress with 22 points on debut against the Crocs.

- AAP