Bullets quickly focus on Sunday home game

Two more injuries to key guards in the first half meant the Brisbane Bullets were hanging on for dear life against the Tasmania JackJumpers on Friday night but now they quickly focus on hosting the Cairns Taipans on Sunday.

The Bullets were already up against it going into the game against the sixth placed JackJumpers on Friday night at MyState Bank Arena without the suspended Terry Taylor, the unavailable Tyrell Harrison and Sam McDaniel, and with Casey Prather, Dakota Mathias, Javon Freeman-Liberty and Lamar Patterson ruled out for the season.

When Ducas aggravated an achilles injury and Devers hurt an ankle in the first quarter, their games were over before half-time and in the end Tasmania put up their biggest ever score and had their biggest NBL win with the final 114-70 scoreline.

In the end, once Ducas and Devers were out for the game in the first half, the pressure was on Taine Murray (36 minutes), Hunter Maldonado (36) and Mitch Norton (30) to stay on the floor for the Bullets.

Maldonado finished with 18 points, five rebounds, two assists and two steals, Norton 17 points, three boards, two assists and a steal, and Murray nine points, three assists and two rebounds.

Jacob Holt (26 minutes) and Tohi Smith-Milner (22) then did a lot of the work in the front court with the former finishing with nine points and nine rebounds, and the latter nine points, three boards and two assists.

Cal Dalton also took his chances for four points and five rebounds on 2/3 shooting in over 11 minutes of court time.

The JackJumpers put up their biggest ever score with 114 points on 60 per cent field goal shooting with 16/33 from downtown with Nick Marshall ending up with 31 points on 7/8 from three.

Josh Bannan added 18 points, Tyger Campbell 15, Nick Stoddart 11, David Johnson 10 and Majok Deng 10.

Taine Murray scored first for the Bullets and Jacob Holt soon completed a three-point play, but the JackJumpers caught fire from behind the three-point arc led by Nick Marshall.

He had five threes on his own in the opening quarter and Tasmania made 9/12 in the opening 10 minutes to go into quarter-time leading 33-14 with the lone three ball from the Bullets courtesy of Murray.

It was tough going again in the second quarter for the Bullets with injuries to Tristan Devers and Alex Ducas not helping matters with the JackJumpers putting up another 24 points to 17 in the period to go into half-time leading 57-31.

Mitch Norton tried to spark the Bullets with four straight points early in the second half but again the JackJumpers went on a 10-0 scoring run as their lead was soon out beyond 30, and was at 33 by three quarter-time.

The Bullets might have been short on fit bodies, but they did fight the game out and ended up with 22 points in the fourth quarter despite Tasmania going on to record their biggest ever win to the tune of 44 points.

The Bullets now return home to the Brisbane Entertainment Centre for the last Sunshine Stoush of the season when they host the Cairns Taipans who will also be coming back from playing in Perth on Friday night.

HUNGRY JACK'S NBL SEASON 2025/26 – ROUND 20

BRISBANE BULLETS 70 (Maldonado 18, Norton 17, Murray 9, Holt 9, Smith-Milner 9)

TASMANIA JACKJUMPERS 114 (Marshall 31, Bannan 18, Campbell 15)

BOX SCORE