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The Breakers are ready to step into the cauldron of playoff basketball for the first time, adamant the Taipans' fanatic home crowd won't affect them in Cairns on Thursday night.
The Breakers' first tilt at a quarter-final in the NBL will take place in front of 5335 orange-clad Taipans fans.
Coach Andrej Lemanis says the atmosphere will be electric, but the team's final regular season match in Perth last Saturday was "great preparation" despite the 98-85 loss.
"It doesn't get more hostile than Perth," Lemanis said. "We as a team did a good job of focusing on what we had to do in that environment and the crowd didn't affect us at all.
"When all you have is each other you get an 'us versus the world' mentality. You can derive strength from that. And, to be honest, it's good fun."
Lemanis says the players are in good shape despite an arduous trek back from Perth on Sunday.
"You can tell everyone knows it's a good time to be playing. There are times during the season where it's a real grind, but it's been fun to head to practice this week.
"There's currently an energy level we don't need to demand. It's just there."
As foundation member Paul Henare said: "I've waited five years for this as has the rest of the club and fans of the team.
"There are five teams who haven't been training this week and as an athlete you prefer to keep going as long as you can. It's just an exciting time."
The Breakers have already beaten the Taipans at the Cairns Convention Centre this season, but have lost to the snakes twice at home.
Their most recent meeting was in November of last year and Henare says both sides are now very different. The Breakers are missing original imports Rick Rickert and Wayne Turner while the Taipans will be without Aaron Grabau and possibly Darnell Mee. Import Jared Newson will be playing the Breakers for the first time.
"We've got new players, they've got new players and probably different styles of basketball from both sides as well," Henare said.
"Once playoffs start, regular season doesn't count for anything. We're nil-all in the playoffs and we have to win one game, that's all we're focused on."
While neither of the Breakers' replacement imports have fronted against the Taipans, exciting point guard Orien Greene says he and fellow newbie Derrick Alston have been studying video of their opponents.
"We're going to be ready," Greene said. "Not knowing them will be challenging, but it's been like that for me and Derrick the whole time we've been here.
"It's also tough with the travel but you play the cards dealt to you. We've worked real hard to get here so we're gonna try and make some noise."
Greene has ample play-off experience at College, but this is the first play-off game of his professional career, which includes 128 NBA matches.
"Defence is the key. We're going to go hard out on defence and be real physical. It's backs to the wall. You go hard or you go home."
While Tony Ronaldson (79 games) and Oscar Forman (3 games) are the only Breakers who have entered an NBL post-season Lemanis says Kirk Penney, Phill Jones and Alston aren't lacking for big-game experience.
"Those guys have been part of championship winning teams right around the world and several others have Olympic or World Championship experience," Lemanis said.
"Given the experience we have in playoff basketball I'm sure we'll make good decisions. We're confident of going into Cairns and doing well.
"Nothing much separates the teams from fifth to eighth. Whoever maintains intensity for the full 48 minutes and takes the opportunities presented will get it done."
The winner of Thursday's will meet the defending champion Bullets in Brisbane on Saturday night. That second sudden-death battle will determine who faces the Melbourne Tigers in a best of three semi-final series starting next Wednesday.
