Sam Froling inspires Hawks stunning return to form against Sydney

Four days after a limp effort in a crushing defeat to Perth, the Hawks blew their arch-rivals out of the water in a 25-8 third term.

After leading by two at halftime, the Hawks kept the Kings to just 3-18 from the field and forced five turnovers in what could prove a season-turning spurt.

Froling had his 20 points at a remarkable 9-10 from the field through three quarters and finished with six rebounds, two assists and two blocks.

Justinian Jessup had 13 of his 15 points in the first half while the match was live, while Tyler Harvey finished with 17 points.

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With coach Brian Goorjian having spoken of the need to find another offensive focal point, he was full or praise for Froling's poise.

"He's got such a great future and he's having a great year and is on the way up," Goorjian said.

"I'm just excited for him tonight. [Sydney] have two good interiors and they obviously went big early and tried to pound it in there and I thought he stood strong."

With Brisbane seeing off Adelaide in Thursday's earlier fixture, the Hawks risked dropping out of the top four for the first time this season with a loss.

They instead re-found the magic that took them to a 4-0 start to the season ahead of what's one again looking like a blockbuster against United on Saturday.

"I thought we went back to what makes us good," Goorjian said.

"We moved the ball, we defended and we kept them from easy baskets.We kept the fouls down, kept them off the offensive glass and did the cornerstones of what we need to do to win.

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"It's a young team, we're going to take our hits, it's [about] how we get up. I keep saying this team is a team that, over time, the community's going to love and I think we showed that character tonight."

The Kings wasted no time getting Jarell Martin involved on his return from injury, the star big man grabbing his side's first four points.

Froling got going with seven early points to push the margin to double digits and force Adam Forde into a timeout. Dejan Vasiljevic had triples either side of another long bomb from Tom Vodanovich on a 9-0 run to immediately cut things back to one.

Casper Ware punctuated the 17-7 run with back to back threes to see the scores locked at 24 apiece at quarter-time.

The Hawks brought the game to their tempo to start the second term, with Harvey dropping his first from deep and Adel and Froling both throwing down transition slams for a six-point lead and a Kings timeout.

The Kings pegged it back to a single point at halftime, but it was as close as they got, with Harvey draining his first attempt from long range in the third.

Adel got firing from the perimeter, with Froling slamming home his 18th point as the lead stretched back out to 10. It ballooned well beyond that on another slam from Adel en route to a 20-point lead.

Vasiljevic grabbed the last of three field goals for the term for the Kings to cut it back to 18 before a quick-fire seven points from Justin Simon put the game to bed early in the fourth.

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