No excuses for Wildcats at NBL Cup

The Perth Wildcats will take a resilient mindset into the NBL Cup, with its first of eight games in Melbourne taking place on Saturday against Melbourne United.

The NBL Cup sees all nine NBL teams playing each other once as part of the mid-season tournament.

While an NBL Cup winner will be declared, the games' results count towards the regular season records.

Wildcats coach Trevor Gleeson said despite the additional away games, his team won’t be making any excuses.

“You can’t be successful with a chip on your shoulder. You’re defeating your own purpose,” he said.

“Our job now is to play the best basketball we can, and control what we can control, not what other people can control.

“We’re trying to build a championship team, we’re not trying to build a team with a chip on our shoulder and say ‘poor me’, that’s a losing mentality. The winning mentality is to say let’s be the best that we can possibly be and we’ll play them in the car park, we’ll play them anywhere.

“That’s the mentality that we have to have a build within the group to be a championship team and that’s our focus.”

Saturday’s matchup against the undefeated Melbourne United side will be an opportunity for the Wildcats to bounce back after a disappointing game on Sunday.

 “They’ve recruited the best, without a question, with Jock Landale and Jack White and a few other pieces, they’ve done really well,” said Gleeson.

“We’re slowly getting there with our new combinations, it’s a work-in-progress so hopefully we can do a pretty good performance this week.”

Perth will be without Clint Steindl as he recovers from a hamstring injury, creating an opportunity for young players Wani Swaka Lo Buluk and Corey Shervill.

Todd Blanchfield returned to training on Friday following a knee collision in the Wildcats last game.

He will be assessed on game day.

Tip off on Saturday is at 2.30pm WA time on VICELAND and SBS On Demand.