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Illawarra Hawks vs South East Melbourne Phoenix Live Stream & Tips - Hawks to seal NBL semi-final success

Ryan Tucker

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Last updated: 27 Feb 2025

Ryan Tucker 27 Feb 2025

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Illawarra Hawks vs South East Melbourne Phoenix expert predictions for Friday’s NBL Finals matchup
Hawks expected to win first semi-final against SEM Phoenix
Illawarra finished top with 20-9 record and strong offense stats

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Illawarra Hawks (Getty Images)

Illawarra Hawks vs South East Melbourne Phoenix Preview

The Illawarra Hawks are backed to win the first semi-final game and take an early series lead. Illawarra dominated the last portion of the regular season and can maintain the momentum of claiming the minor premiership.

Illawarra Hawks vs South East Melbourne Phoenix Preview
Head to Head
Illawarra Hawks Form
South East Melbourne Phoenix Form

Illawarra have won 5 of their last 6 first quarters and have gone on to win the game outright on all 5 occasions.
SEM are 3-7 in their last 10 road games allowing an average of 102 pts per game to opponents.
The Phoenix have a 7-12 record this season as the Underdog.
Tyler Harvey has scored 20+ pts in 6 of the last 7 games against SEM at home.

Head to Head

2024/25 Match Results

Dec 31st 24: Illawarra 105-110 South East Melbourne

Nov 30th 24: South East Melbourne 103-100 Illawarra

Oct 26th 24: South East Melbourne 82-88 Illawarra

2023/24 Season Series

Illawarra Hawks won 3-0

Illawarra Hawks Form

The Hawks finished the regular season on top of the ladder with a 20-9 record, taking the minor premiership for the first time in the club’s history.

Finishing first has though it’s drawbacks with the Hawks not having played a competitive game of basketball in 21 days by the time they step onto the court against SEM.

The break has allowed Darius Days to continue his rehabilitation from injury but definitely will have an effect on the momentum that the Hawks had built up through the last third of the season.

In their last 10 games, Illawarra had a 8-2 record and finished out the season as the number 1 scoring team.

They averaged 101.4 pts per game over the year with the league’s best FG% at 48.6% thanks to their dominance in the paint where half of their points every week were coming.

The Hawks finished top of the league in FG%, Points per Possession, Effective Field Goal %, True Shooting %, Points in the Paint, 2nd Chance Points, Fast Break Points, Points off Turnovers and equal first in Bench Points.

They were also top 5 in most defensive statistics despite having such an offence weighted game style.

South East Melbourne Phoenix Form

South East Melbourne have been a resurgent team this season. Starting off by going 0-5 and kicking their coach to the kerb the team with one of the highest number of player turnover from last season kicked into gear midway through the season to secure themselves a play-in spot against Perth.

They went on to lose that game 122-105 but then demonstrated resilience in their comeback victory over the Adelaide 36ers in the final play-in game to book their spot in the semi’s against Illawarra.

The Phoenix were down 21 points to the 36ers in their elimination play-in game, scoring just 26 points in the first half.

Coach Josh King adjusted his lineups after the main break which allowed a strong offensive output while stopping the Adelaide onslaught.

Matt Hurt, Nathan Sobey, Agnus Glover and Ben Ayre all contributed offensively to get their team over the line.

On the season SEM ranked 3rd in offence and 6th in defence, over their last 10 games though the Phoenix moved up to equal 2nd in scoring.

Verdict

Illawarra Hawks v SE Melbourne Phoenix

Expect the Hawks to come out firing early taking the 1st quarter and going over their team total. Tyler Harvey has matched up well against SEM, take him to go over his points total.

Illawarra -1.5

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Illawarra over 100.5

Team Total

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