Cairns coach Aaron Fearne has warned against locking in NBL pacesetters New Zealand and Perth for the top two spots after his team beat the Wildcats and lowly Wollongong humbled the Breakers.
Ladder-leading New Zealand (15-6) had their five-game winning streak snapped at Wollongong (6-14), where the eighth-placed Hawks scored a 80-64 victory.
The form book was also turned upside down in Cairns where second-placed Perth (14-7) fell over.
The fifth-placed Taipans (12-9) scored a 76-67 win over the Wildcats, who suffered a second straight loss.
Surging Gold Coast (11-8) moved above Townsville into third, recording a fifth straight victory with an 84-72 win in Sydney (8-13).
“I think there’s pressure on everybody,” Fearne told AAP.
“NZ losing that game and Perth dropping that game obviously bring them all one game back to the three Queensland teams.
“I don’t know if I’d lock in Perth, New Zealand to be 1-2 right now either.
“I think there’s still a lot of basketball to be played. I think there might be a few surprises.”
Cairns scorched Perth with a 14-0 run to start the third quarter.
“The momentum we had in the third quarter was unbelievable,” Fearne said.
“The atmosphere at the stadium was probably the loudest I’ve ever heard it, and it just kept going and going and going.
“Credit to the guys, they really got after it and played very aggressively and very physically.
“That reflected on getting us on top of them in the rebound count which doesn’t happen too often against Perth – that was a huge aspect of the game.”
Cairns were again sparked by import guard Jamar Wilson, who torched the Wildcats for 24 points.
“I don’t know if there’s a player in the league that’s contributed to as many wins as what Jamar has for us,” Fearne said.
“Down the stretch of games, he’s a closer, he’s made huge play after huge play.
“Teams know that and they need to stop him and struggle to do that, so he’s been excellent.”
Wollongong’s Oscar Forman continued his incredible resurgence with a career-high 29-point haul against New Zealand.
“For us, the alertness and attention to detail of what we were trying to do at the start of the game wasn’t there,” Breakers coach Andrej Lemanis said.
“That might have put us on the back foot and we were never able to recover from that.”
Gold Coast overcame a four-point halftime deficit against Sydney, who managed just 30 second-half points.
Guards Adris Deleon scored 29 and Adam Gibson 17 respectively, the latter getting 15 in the Coast’s decisive third-quarter surge.
The upsets continued as Townsville (11-9) missed a chance to regain third spot from Gold Coast and slipped to fifth below Cairns, with a 79-74 loss away to last-placed Adelaide (6-15).
Centre Daniel Johnson scored 20 points and Darren Ng and Diamon Simpson both tallied 19 for Adelaide, who broke their six-match losing streak.
