It has been almost two weeks since the NBA Finals ended, but Bermuda’s equivalent of the Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers will be tipping off at Somersfield Academy tonight.

Twisters are the equivalent to the Warriors, sitting pretty atop the Summer Island Basketball League with five wins and no losses. Meanwhile, the Thundercats play the role of the Cavs: what could have been a shoot-out between undefeated teams is now a case of the Cats looking to rebound from their first defeat of the season by taking on their biggest title rivals.

The Thundercats, led by player-coach Jason Lowe, are 6-1 this season, with their first blemish coming on Wednesday night at Somersfield when they went down 87-84 to International Ballers, who hold the No 4 seed in the league at present with a 4-3-1 record.

But Lowe is confident his team can come back strong from that reverse in what has been an otherwise impressive campaign.

“Everybody’s bought into the concept that I’m trying to get the team to play at: pressure defence, moving the ball on offence and it really helps that we’ve got a nice mixture of veteran experience with some young legs as well,” Lowe said. “We’ve got some young guys on the national squad and some young guys who are also part of the Under-19 national squad.

“Kobe Reid will be captain of the Under-19 national squad. He’s at MSA going into his junior year, I believe. He’s 6ft 3in, very smart, a good ball-handler, very good at attacking the basket, very coachable.

“Zavante Garnett, We call him Z, he’s just the energy man off the bench. Whatever you need him to do, he’ll do all the dirty work, he won’t complain and he’ll play hard.

“Then we’ve got some other relatively young guys, in their early twenties, guys like Kieron Burgess, who’s going off to college with Medicine Hat in Alberta, Canada, having just come off a tour of the Dominican Republic.”

Lowe hinted that his team lacked discipline and were too tight during their defeat in midweek.

“I think we got a bit too emotionally involved,” he said. “We forgot that basketball’s a game that you’re supposed to have fun with. We took it a bit too seriously [on Wednesday] and that caused some mental lapses.

“We didn’t protect the three-point line; this is a very smart team. So if you’re not disciplined they will pick you apart. It was just missed opportunities; turning the ball over and not playing defence.”

One twist for the Twisters will be the probable absence of star man Omari Dill-Pettiford, the guard who has just completed his sophomore season at NCAA Division II Wilmington University in Delaware. But Twisters’ Sabur Rey is confident that his team can step up in their biggest test of the season.

“Team basketball and chemistry,” Rey explained when asked about the secret of his team’s success. “We’ve had the core same group for the past two to three years.”

Rey said that his team would not need to adjust despite Dill-Pettiford’s absence.

“It’ll probably still be the same game plan,” Rey said. “We’ll be missing his scoring ability but we have other guys that can fill in and I believe we can step up and get the W.

“I’ll probably be one of them! I consider myself to be the best shooter in Bermuda! Stevie Brown, Gikai Clarke, he’s a real trigger shooter, he can get a lot of shots for us.

“We’ve got some big guys as well, Alex Butterfield is coming back out for us, so we’ve got some key role players.”

Both teams are confident of winning, with Lowe appearing disappointed that Dill-Pettiford will not be playing this evening.

“I wish he was there, just so we can beat them at their full strength,” Lowe said. “But it should still be a very competitive game. The rest of those guys can really play. They’ve been playing together for a little while, but if we come to play our game, I expect we’ll beat them by double digits.”

Rey was a little less bullish, but no less confident about who he expects to come out on top.

He said: “Prediction? A win! I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt, they might keep it to single digits!”

The contest tips off at 6,30pm at Somersfield Academy today, with Flyboys taking on Redraiders at 7.45 and International Ballers facing Sky Force at 9pm.

It will be a busy weekend for Twisters and Thundercats, with both teams in action tomorrow too. Twisters take on Redraiders at 6.30 and Thundercats face Sky Force at 7.45.