Brisbane took advantage of the absence of Mark Bradtke to ambush the Tigers and win its first Brisbane Convention Centre outing. The Bullets were paced by their backcourt of point guard Steve Woodberry (28 points on 11-for-18 shooting) and Mike McKay (24 points). Melbourne import Jarvis Lang finished with 24 points on debut. Brisbane inflated a 23-point lead before holding off a late Andrew Gaze-inspired rally. "A win's good but the second half was far from convincing," Brisbane coach Dave Ingham said. "At training we were concentrating on not getting too pumped up with playing at our new home, and that worked well early."
Brisbane: Woodberry 28, McKay 24, White 23, Loggins 20, Smith 14, Dalton 2.
Melbourne: Gaze 33, Lang 24, Copeland 19, Smith 15, Gordon 14.
