If there's a positive from a second straight loss, Brian Goorjian is glad the Sydney Kings don't have 11 days to wait to play again but he was concerned with how there wasn’t a lot of reprieve for his guns as they suffered a second straight defeat.

Having started their championship defence with three straight wins, the Kings have now lost their past two games after falling in Canberra in their Ignite Cup by 7-Eleven match up with the New Zealand Breakers.

The Kings almost pulled off a miracle fightback with four three-point bombs from Torrey Craig in the last two minutes but fell a point short and what Goorjian was left to lament was the struggles of his team with certain line-ups.

Sydney were 10 points up at half-time after a 32-point second quarter, but then had just 12 points on 4/20 shooting in the third and by the end of the night he felt he had to ride too long with his guns.

Craig (32:28), Kendric Davis (38:40), Xavier Cooks (32:17) and Makuach Maluach (32:11) had to play big minutes while the Kings lost Jason Spurgin to a hand injury after 3:48 and they were -16 in the 13:32 that Will Johnston was out there.

Sydney have now played just five games so far this season and Goorjian does feel there's a feeling out process in terms of him still working out how to get the best out of his line-ups.

"I think overall we had some really good patches defensively and offensively, but we didn’t play real well with certain combinations on the floor," Goorjian said.

"It just looked uncomfortable and the four or five guys that were comfortable together, got worn out.

"We've got a lot of talent here on this team that we're excited about, and it falls on basically just getting more contribution from the bench and getting them comfortable on the floor playing with one another.

"It's different guys in different spots and you come in and you're Tyler Robertson playing the four and guarding the five, and playing with KD and Will. There's just groups that are uncomfortable right now.

"I don’t know if it's a wear down factor from playing the main group a lot of minutes, but when I went to the bench the line-ups were uncomfortable in that third quarter."

While acknowledging every team is dealing with injuries and going through something with their personnel, not having Matthew Dellavedova against the Breakers is something that Goorjian feels had a significant impact.

But now he's focusing already on hosting a Perth Wildcats team this Saturday night who will be playing their first road game of NBL27 and arrives on a four-game winning streak.

"Early in the year we had a 50-point game with them (off the bench opposed to four on Wednesday) and everyone's dealing with injuries and everything, but Delly helps in the area that we're talking about as far as structure goes," Goorjian said.

"He's helpful to the rest of the group and organising things. We've got some challenges ahead but I did think that there were spots during the game and passages that were there to be excited about.

"I'm glad that we're not waiting 11 days and have another game coming with another tough team, but we just have to get better on the hop. We might have to roll the dice a little bit more and play those young guys a little bit more, and let them figure it out."

On the back of his Championship Series MVP in NBL26 and being runner-up MVP the past two seasons, Kendric Davis had a strong start to NBL27 with the Kings too with 27.0 points, 6.3 assists and 5.7 rebounds on 62 per cent shooting over their opening three wins.

But the last two games has seen him find the going tougher with 16.5 points, 9.0 assists and 3.5 rebounds on 42 per cent shooting and going just 3/15 from the outside.

Not only that, but Davis had four turnovers in the opening three games but now 10 in the losses to Adelaide and New Zealand, but Goorjian feels a lot of it is the team and him as a coach finding him more help given the defensive pressure applied to him.

"You go into the second year and he's being played a lot differently just with the double teams and stuff," Goorjian said.

"I've got to get better at the spacing with the players around him, and penalise that, but right now he'd have to take four guys on to get something going.

"It's hard because every time he crosses halfcourt or there's a ball screen, there's two guys coming to him and that's what I'm saying about the guys playing around him getting comfortable.

"There is a frustration there but you knew it was coming this year and the second year is always tougher, and we've gone through a lot of change.

"There's a process here and we've gotta get these young guys comfortable where we can penalise teams for the way they're guarding Kendric."

The Kings did only play four games over the opening four rounds of the season including having 11 days in between beating the Brisbane Bullets and then losing to Adelaide this past Sunday.

Goorjian is glad they now have a shorter turnaround before hosting the Wildcats on Saturday night and trying to avoid a third straight defeat, but he knows they do have some work to do.

"I thought the head place was good and it wasn’t for 40 minutes, but there were some really good patches in the game that we can build on," Goorjian said.

"Thankfully we don't have an 11-day wait but the other aspect is that these are home games and you can't get them back. Now this next one becomes really important.

"There were some positives there but I did think for all of them, Torrey, KD, Xavier, there was a wear down factor and it's on me now to get more out of the bench."

Chris Pike

Goorj to iron out uncomfortable line-ups