The Breakers have reignited their NBL campaign with a fighting 96-89 win over the Brisbane Bullets in Auckland.
After building up a nine-game winning streak, the Breakers had lost momentum with an 89-73 loss to Perth followed by a listless 81-76 defeat to Brisbane on Sunday.
Four days later, a more clinical shooting performance and some superb offensive rebounding put them back on track against a Bullets outfit yet to record a win on the road this season.
Coach Paul Henare was pleased with his team's improvement.
"The intent with which we played with the ball was great," he said.
"The effort of [Edgar] Sosa and DJ Newbill in the face of their press, those were areas we wanted to improve on and we did tonight."
Bullets coach Andrej Lemanis was happy with his team's commitment, but said they had fallen off defensively.
"Over the past four or five games I thought our defence had been good, but tonight we regressed a little," he said.
"We tried but did we put it in the right areas? The stats would suggest it was a little misplaced."
A Tom Abercrombie trey opened the scoring for the Breakers, followed in quick time by a second from DJ Newbill as the Breakers worked hard on an up-tempo start after Sunday's lacklustre loss.
Ahead 24-23 at the end of the first spell, the Kiwis edged fractionally ahead in an even second quarter to hold a 49-47 halftime lead.
Abercrombie, who managed just seven points in Sunday's loss, impressed from long range in the first half, sinking two from beyond the paint then opening the third quarter with back-to-back threes.
The Breakers managed to extend their lead to 73-69 at the three-quarter mark, Brisbane hit hard when Tom Jervis fouled out with just under eight minutes of the game remaining.
He still managed 20 points, with back-up from Daniel Kickert (16) and Perrin Buford, who added 11 points, eight rebounds and five assists.
For the Breakers, Abercrombie fronted with a game-leading 22 points including a perfect five from five from deep, and 12 rebounds, with Newbill also playing a key hand in amassing 17 points, five rebounds, eight assists and three steals.
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