Southern Huskies pulled off a miraculous come-from-behind victory against eighth-placed Supercity Rangers in Tuaranga, defeating the hosts 108-104.
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Former Chicago Bulls Summer league player and New Zealand basketball veteran Marcel Jones found another gear for the Huskies, dropping 27 points and collecting 17 rebounds in a standout performance from the 33-year-old.
Leading rebounds per game for the NZNBL, Jones also gave out two assists in his 33 minutes on the court to rally the Huskies back from the brink.
Staring down the barrel of their fifth loss of the season, the Huskies were facing an uphill battle early as the hosts burst out of the blocks with a 35-13 lead at quarter time threatening to get ugly.
Jones, Jalen Billups, Craig Moller and Tre Nichols all began to show their class in the second quarter to pull back the deficit to an interesting 14 points.
Slowly making amends at the lead after their slow start, the Huskies chipped away throughout the third, producing a 26-21 term to bring the score to 86-77 in the Rangers favour and set the scene for a massive last quarter.
Rangers' Timothy Quarterman and former Fremantle Docker Moller traded three-point blows to begin the final term with opponent Nnanna Egwu rendering another Jones two-pointer effectively invalid with a three-pointer of his own to have the score at 92-82 with nine minutes remaining.
Burnie's Mason Bragg, Jones and Moller then scored within five minutes whilst keeping the hosts to only two points to chip away at the lead and make it a two point game before Lesae Coe looked like breaking Huskies' hearts with consecutive three-point buckets.
Enter Marcel Jones.
Jones dropped six points in just over two minutes in order to level the game at 102 apiece with 76 seconds left on the clock and momentum firmly in the Huskies' corner.
A layup from Billups followed by a Jones steal off an average Quarterman pass led to a Nichols jump shot and that was all she wrote, confirming a momentous Huskies victory.
Assisting Jones with the scoring duties was Billups' 23 points and 8 rebounds with Moller also securing a 21-point game for the victorious travelling Huskies.
Rangers' Quarterman entered the encounter as the highest averaging scorer for the competition, downing 28.5 points per game but the Huskies kept him to only 19 as Supercity's imports Nnanna Egwu and Lesae Coe dropped 25 and 22 points respectively.
Quarterman's influence wasn't entirely quashed for the home side as the 198cm former Portland Trailblazer provided a game-high 15 assists for the Rangers.
The victory places the six-win, four-loss Huskies in the top four of New Zealand's strongest basketball competition following a two-win stint on the road.
A unique three-game series against the Canterbury Rams awaits the Southern side, with a June 6 date at the Derwent Entertainment Centre, a Silverdome clash two days later and an across the ditch duel set for June 14.
The Rams sit one spot above the Huskies on the ladder with seven wins and two losses, picking up five consecutive wins in the process, making the next three matches crucial for Tasmania's side.