NBL1 West: Flames too hot for Magic in local derby

The Rockingham Flames teams were on fire on Tuesday night in their local derby with the Mandurah Magic in front of a huge crowd at Mike Barnett Sports Complex.

In the women's game, Rockingham were just too strong for Mandurah defeating them 90-63.

The scores were even at the end of the first quarter but the Flames put their foot down outscoring the Magic in the last three, sealing the win on their home court.

Alex Ciabattoni and Alex Sharp were standouts for the Flames collecting a combined 52 points.

Mandurah Magic coach Vlad Alava said it was disappointing not to get the win.

"We just got outplayed," he said.

"Rockingham, to their credit, played very well from start to finish.

"It just wasn't our night...we're going to see it as a blip in our season and prior to that we had been in good form...we're not going to get carried away with the loss."

The victory pushes Rockingham up to fifth on the ladder and Mandurah down to sixth.

In the men's clash, a career best 51 points from Mandurah Magic's Lachie Bertram wasn't enough to get the win over the Flames.

The Magic, without two of their best players, Julian Pesava and Jahcoree Ealy, managed to keep up with Rockingham in the first quarter before the Flames started to pull away, growing their lead by as much as 28 points in the fourth quarter.

Mandurah tried to fight back eventually closing the margin to 15 points.

Coach Mark Utley praised Bertram's performance, especially in the final quarter where he scored 25 points.

"We got down by about 20...he's a competitor like me and he wanted to keep playing to bring it back to closer and he shot the ball amazing and got 51 which is quite the feat."

The win sees Rockingham cement their place at the top of the ladder while Mandurah, the reigning champions, have dropped to seventh with just two rounds remaining of the regular season.