Wheelcats Win NWBL Title

Published On: 2 September 2013

The victorious Perth Wheelcats - 2013 NWBL Champions

A dominant third quarter performance has helped the Perth Wheelcats turnaround a half time deficit to claim the 2013 National Wheelchair Basketball League title in Adelaide.

Perth reached the grand final on the back of an undefeated season that saw them win the minor premiership before defeating arch rivals – the Wollongong Roller Hawks (75-69) in their major semi final.

Wollongong was forced to defeat the victors of the minor semi final, Victoria in the Preliminary Final, which they did 63-52 to set up the showpiece final that had been tipped from round one.

The Wheelcats entered the match as the hottest of favourites, but found the going tough early on, particularly against an in form and fired up Brett Stibners. The script went out the window, with Perth down by two points at half time, trailing 34-32.

Faced with the prospect of an undefeated season ending in finals misery, the Wheelcats’ WAIS representatives came to the fore, with Justin Eveson, Shaun Norris and the defensive excellence of Michael Hartnett helping to inspire a title winning third quarter effort in which the Wheelcats outscored their opponents 24 points to ten to reverse a deficit into a 12 point lead that it would maintain throughout the final term to record an emotional 71-59 win.

Norris and Hartnett played the entire match for the Wheelcats, with Norris hitting a match high 26 points to go with eight assists in a best on court performance. Eveson contributed 16 points, whilst four-time Paralympian Brad Ness (WAIS) added a further 14 as the Wheelcats shared the scoring load.

Stibners played largely a lone hand for the Roller Hawks, with his 23 points and five assists, unlucky to be on the losing side.

The Championship was Perth’s first since 2011, and featured five Paralympians, with Sarah Vinci, Hartnett, Eveson and Norris all Australian representatives alongside Brad Ness.

Following the match, Shaun Norris was named Finals series MVP, whilst also collecting the mid-pointer (based on level of disability) MVP of the season. Michael Hartnett was awarded the low-pointer MVP, whilst Justin Eveson scooped the league’s top game average scorer award, with 24 points per game for 2013.

Rounding out a thoroughly successful campaign, Michael Hartnett, Shaun Norris and Justin Eveson were all named on the NWBL All Star Five, team of the year.