Last roll of the dice

Star import Jay Warren will play in the must-win Game 2 of the Collie Crane Hire South West Slammers’ quarter-final series against the East Perth Eagles at the Morley Sport and Recreation Centre tonight.

Warren missed Game 1, a 102-70 loss at the Eaton Recreation Centre, with a swollen ankle, and was forced to watch from the sideline as his team spluttered on offence all night.

With Warren off the court, playing coach Ty Harrelson received the bulk of the Eagles’ defensive attention and struggled as a result, hitting just three of 17 from the field.

Warren’s return should reinvigorate a Slammers team which averaged 105 points per game in the final seven regular season matches — six of which were victories.

“Jay is one of the top scorers in the league and if you add his usual contribution to our final score on the weekend you get a much closer game,” Harrelson said.

“Josh Weir is also coming back from injury this week and he is very important for us as well. Both Jay and Josh have been training all week and the mood within the squad is good.”

East Perth were impressive across the court in Game 1 but guard Joe-Alan Tupaea was especially dominant, scoring 21 points to go with eight rebounds and eight assists.

“We knew going into the game that it would be up to Joe-Alan to beat us and that’s what he did,” Harrelson said.

“We were focused on stopping (Tom) Jervis and (Drew) Williamson and I think we did a pretty good job on them, but Tupaea was too good on the night.”

Harrelson said limiting Tupaea’s influence and disrupting the Eagles from beyond the threepoint line would be crucial to avoiding defeat.

“They hit 15 of 31 threes, which is a pretty good return, so we are going to have to defend the perimeter and their guards a lot better,” he said.

“We also just need to do a better job of our own offensive execution because things just weren’t clicking in Game 1.”

Should the Slammers win tomorrow’s clash they will remain in Perth for a deciding Game 3 on Saturday at the same venue.