Fantastic Grida not enough for Giants

The NBS Nelson Giants’ horrid home form continued tonight as it went down to the tenth-placed Southland Sharks 98-83 at the Trafalgar Centre.

The result is the Giants fifth home loss in a row, but its impressive away performances mean it is still in the hunt for a top six finish in this season’s NBL, which would earn it a spot in the postseason.

The Giants can put tonight’s loss down to a slow start which saw the visiting Sharks get out to a healthy 26-10 lead after the first quarter.

The Giants, without its starting centre Theo Akwuba, struggled to match the height of Southland’s big man Callum McRae who mopped up loose shots on offence and proved difficult to get around on defence.

While the Giants were missing Hayden Jones and Dan Fotu, along with Akwuba, one man who did stand up for the home team was Dan Grida who single-handedly attempted to drag his side back into the game with 22 points and four rebounds in the first half alone.

Down by ten at halftime, Nelson just couldn’t get going in the third quarter, every time it looked to close the gap, Southland would hit back to keep the lead between 8 and 12 points for most of the quarter.

The final quarter was more of the same, the Giants not doing enough to close the gap despite the very best efforts of Grida who finished with a game-high 40 points.

Despite the loss, the Giants are still in sixth place with 16 points, two ahead of Tauranga Whai with two games remaining in the regular season. The Giants have one more home game, against the Otago Nuggets this Friday night.