THE Adelaide 36ers and Perth Wildcats momentarily appeared headed for historic wins against NBA teams but the fairytale didn’t materialise.

The Utah Jazz overran the 36ers in the final quarter in Salt Lake City on Friday to take a comfortable 129-99 victory.

In Colorado it was a similar story, with the Wildcats pushing the Denver Nuggets before falling 96-88.

“We knew they were going to come out and compete and they did that,” said Nuggets point guard Monte Morris, who was full of praise for the Wildcats.

The games were the final instalments of the seven-game NBL-NBA series played across North America and Hawaii in the past week, with the billion dollar-plus NBA franchises victorious against the minnows from Australia and New Zealand.

The 36ers appeared set for a massive upset against an undermanned Jazz. Adelaide’s starters all shot more than 40 per cent from the field for the game and Nathan Sobey top-scored with 25.

The 36ers took a 31-28 lead at the end of the first quarter and stayed close to the Jazz until the fourth quarter.

The Jazz didn’t play French giant Rudy Gobert and Australian guard Dante Exum, while Adelaide-raised star Joe Ingles had a poor shooting night, missing all four field-goal attempts.

Jazz coach Quin Snyder sat Ingles and the team’s other starters Donovan Mitchell, Ricky Rubio and Jae Crowder in the second half.

The Wildcats, who a week ago were thrashed 130-72 by the Jazz, trailed by just one point late in the third quarter against the Nuggets.

The Nuggets also ran away in the final quarter.

Perth shooting guard Bryce Cotton might receive some interest from NBA teams after top-scoring with 33 points, including sinking five of 10 three-point attempts.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Bryce Cotton was on 🔥 as he dropped an all-time high for an NBL player against an NBA team.<br><br>3⃣3⃣ points<br>5⃣ rebounds<br>5⃣ three-pointers<br><br>Report ➡️ <a href="https://t.co/JcoqIeZFke">https://t.co/JcoqIeZFke</a> <a href="https://t.co/2qu9pQzQC6">pic.twitter.com/2qu9pQzQC6</a></p>&mdash; NBA Australia (@NBA_AU) <a href="https://twitter.com/NBA_AU/status/1048415398566088704?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 6, 2018</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Meanwhile, Melbourne were competitive for much of the first half before being blown away in a brutal third quarter which led to the 120-82 beatdown in Toronto.
Chris Goulding overcame an ankle injury to be Melbourne's equal leading scorer, equal with guard Casper Ware with 17, but they had no answers for Toronto guard Norman Powell who had a game-high 21 points in a sizzling third-quarter display.