Wizards blocking out the "noise"

The Northside Wizards are one of three teams still undefeated this season, sitting atop the NBL1 North women’s ladder with an 11-0 record. 

The reigning champions have retooled this season, with Courtney Woods departing and bringing in Erin Bollmann to compensate. Despite the disruption, they’ve maintained their dominance, and Heritage Round was no different. 

Wearing throwback jerseys, the now purple and yellow Wizards took down the second-placed Townsville Flames 79-65. 

The Wizards were led by Nadeen Payne, who scored 26 points and nine rebounds, and said the match-up was something the team was looking forward to. 

“Yeah that was hard, but it was good though. We were really looking forward to playing Townsville, they are playing really well,” she told Jon Guarna post-game. 

“They’ve got two really good bigs, so it was good for me and AJ (Johnson) to go against that.” 

Despite the streak, Payne said the team isn’t concerned with the “noise” surrounding it. 

“We aren’t really too worried about the 11-0 thing, I think that’s a lot of noise,” she said.

“We are just working to get better every game and trying to figure it out, like everyone is. We are priding ourselves defensively… We’ll figure it out as we go, but we are having fun.” 

Flagging the team’s interior defensive issues, Payne and the Wizards will readjust and take on Darwin Salties’ frontcourt on Saturday, streaming live from 5:00pm AEST via NBL1.com.au or the NBL1 App.