Melbourne hold off Taipans in NBL

Melbourne United have returned to the NBL top four with a vital 92-85 win over the Cairns Taipans on Saturday night.Appearing poised for a comfortable win after leading by 15 points in the third quarter, the home fans at the State Netball and Hockey Centre in Melbourne were left stunned as captain Chris Goulding, returning from an ankle injury, was carried from the court after appearing to roll his ankle again. Cairns quickly roared back to close the gap to two points but with Goulding fit to return and Casper Ware (31 points) firing late, Melbourne held off the Taipans for their 11th win of the season.Mark Worthington top scored for Cairns with 15 points while Cairns point guard Travis Trice, held scoreless in the first quarter, finished with 14.Goulding showed no ill-effects from his injury layoff with 10 points in the opening quarter but strong work under the basket from Nathan Jawai and hot shooting from Mitch McCarron saw the visitors ahead at the first break.New import Lasan Kromah, replacing Ramone Moore who was ruled out for the rest of the season with a calf injury, hit his first shot on a three-pointer.Melbourne responded in the second quarter with Kyle Adnam setting up Majok Majok for a strong one-handed alley-oop dunk.Five straight points from Ware put United back in front at the midway point with the home side going on to outscore Cairns 23-14 to lead 46-39 at halftime.United opened the third quarter with a 11-3 spurt but when Goulding hobbled to the bench after hitting his fourth triple of the night, Cairns went on to score the next eight points and threatened to take a shock lead. But the home fans breathed a sigh of relief as Goulding returned to the court and United steadied behind Ware and Josh Boone to lead by six at the final change.Goulding opened the fourth with back-to-back triples but Cairns stayed in touch all the way until the final two minutes with Ware twice making acrobatic layups as he was fouled to close out the match.

With the season series up for grabs, United coach Dean Demopoulos knew the importance of claiming victory.

"I thought it was terrific, especially against a group like that," Demopoulos said.

"They are well coached, they play hard, they are as good as anybody."

Cairns coach Aaron Fearne felt his side didn't fully recover after Goulding's hot start while Ware's strong play down the stretch also hurt.

"We had patches there where we could slow them down but they just kept making big shots," Fearne said.

"I'm proud of the fight from our guys. They really battled but just weren't good enough."