WITH the battle for spots in the Basketball New South Wales Youth League Men’s Division Two finals series already looking like a tight affair, Bathurst coach Andrew Osborn is glad he has depth in his squad.
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The Bathurst Goldminers have a three and two record after five rounds, an effort which has them sixth on the ladder.
Newcastle and Moss Vale hold down first and second thanks to their undefeated records, while seventh placed Liverpool-Macarthur shares the Goldminers’ 60 percent winning ratio and Manly Warringah (50 percent) is not far behind.
“It’s still early in the season, but I think it’s obvious that you’ve got two distinct halves in the draw … there looks to be seven or eight sides who will battle for the top spots and the other five or six will struggle,” Osborn said.
Underlining the coach’s point is that while Goldminers came within six points of beating Moss Vale in March, they cruised to a 102-71 victory in their most recent outing against 12th placed Penrith.
That result came in the absence of Will Cranston-Lown and Blake Schaefer as Osborn’s bench players proved their worth.
“If we can build on the good things we did [against] Penrith, that will be to our benefit and we didn’t have all our players – two of our starters weren’t there,” he said.
“The bench did a terrific job, they got a lot of court time and at the end of the game they were beaming because they played good defence and they all scored. They were tickled pink.
“When your bench players come into a game and do a job for you, that’s when you know your team is starting to gel.”
Bathurst’s next match is against Liverpool.
