THEY may have lost by almost 50 points, but the Dubbo Rams have taken a lot of positives out of Saturday's State League match against the top-of-the-ladder Canberra Gunners.
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The Rams were feeling the road-trip and got off to a rocky start against the hosts, who led 25-9 going into the break and ran away to win the game 93-46.
But coach Damien Reid said the Rams had never expected to topple the unbeaten Gunners and instead went to Canberra with their own goals - which they achieved.
"We went over there with a goal of trying to keep them to 80 points and definitely under 100 and we wanted to continue to get our average points on the board which we did," Reid said.
"We kept them under 100 and we got the points on the board."
In a coup for the competition's bottom team, the Rams kept their intensity up to outscore the Gunners in the final quarter, despite being more than 50 points down.
The Gunners were leading 82-29 going into the final quarter after piling on 25, 30 and 27 points in each of the first three periods.
While the Rams had scored just nine, 15 and five points in their first three quarters, they stepped up the pressure in the fourth to put 17 points on the board and limit the Gunners to just 11.
"Their level of intensity dropped off and ours kind of picked up," Reid said.
"I know the game was well and truly over...win or lose every quarter's a battle for us and even winning one quarter is just a huge positive for us.
"We were just committed to every play. Every player that played, whether they were on the bench or on the court they were totally involved in the game."
The Rams were also hurt by having a short roster, with eight players taking the court to Canberra's 12.
The Rams leading points scorer Ben Wilkins was out with other commitments, but Dan Medway and Kristjan Reinhold stepped up to put on 12 points apiece in his absence.
Reid said the squad will now turn their attention to next week's fixture against the Bathurst Goldminers, and to continuing their improvement through the rest of the season.
"We're pretty realistic. It's about developing for the future of Dubbo basketball," he said.
"We're not going to get the results we need now but we're building for that future.
"The effort, the boys just never give up no matter what the scoreboard says.
"A lot of other teams would give up and just quit but we just don't have that quit in us."
