Illawarra Hawks head coach Justin Tatum chats with Mercury reporter Agron Latifi ahead of this weekend's Melbourne United showdown.
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00:00I see a huge game coming up on Saturday, top of the table. How are the guys feeling?
00:05For this weekend against Melbourne, I'm feeling pretty good. We let one get away this past Monday.
00:11We're ready to get back out here and show how wild we are top of the ladder, so guys feel pretty good today.
00:16There's a lot of history between these two clubs. They beat us here in Woolloongong, you guys beat them there.
00:22Last time there was the Chris Golding incident, your own comments. There's a lot of storylines, isn't there?
00:29Yeah, a ton of storylines. They're going to bring them all back up.
00:32But at the end of the day, we're just worried about finding a way to stay on top of the ladder and how we play good hockey basketball.
00:37We got away from that first half, last game, and we want to find a way to get our mojo back.
00:41It's going to be against Melbourne, which all the extra explicity is going to be about, which we understand we get, but we just want to play hockey basketball.
00:48Two of the last three home games, so important to win at home?
00:52It is, it is, and give ourselves a chance to stay on top of the ladder.
00:56Our best advantage is playing at home, even though we have a solid world record, but we love playing in front of our fans.
01:02United have sort of bounced back the last couple of games, haven't they?
01:05And it's been that man, Chris Golding, who's sort of stepped up to the fore. What's it going to take to win?
01:10A team effort, attention to details, making sure that they don't get offensive rebounds and kick it back to them when they get into their rhythm.
01:16Our primary main defenders have to really stay locked in, but everybody else has got to be vocal and help them out.
01:21So, a total team effort.
01:23How's it going to be to get your players to concentrate on the job at hand?
01:26Because it is very emotional, isn't it, Scott?
01:28It's teams playing against teams they know they're probably going to meet in the finals.
01:32Yeah, it is, and that's one thing we talked about in the film today, is controlling what we can control.
01:39Teams are going to be more aggressive with us, they're going to make shots that they didn't make against the other teams.
01:43But then at the end of the day, we've got to control our emotions and control the way we play and stay on task.
01:49It's a lot of things that are dealing with us, but we understand teams have to find a way to throw us off.
01:53Any message for Hawks fans coming up this Saturday?
01:56Be loud and be proud this Saturday, Hawks fans, because we're going to be ready to go.