IT is an exciting time for Worcester Wolves as we prepare to take on Surrey Heat in the British Basketball League play-off quarter-finals.

Hopefully it will be a full house at the University of Worcester on Saturday (7pm) as well as being a bit spicy when we go back to Guildford on Sunday (3pm).

The club has never got to the semi-finals of the play-offs before and I’m really pleased I have got the opportunity to try and lead the team to that.

Last year I think we just ran out of gas at the same stage against Cheshire Jets and had a bad patch at the wrong time. I think now we are peaking at the right time for the play-offs so it’s a fantastic opportunity.

We have played Surrey three times this season, losing two very close games and winning the other, but the key thing is we have faced them every time without Sherrad Prezzie-Blue and he’s coming back into some form which makes such a difference.

The team’s return to form was shown with the victories over Leicester Riders and Plymouth Raiders last weekend.

We were due a good game and Leicester rested some of their players, which they have earned the right to do by winning the championship.

That worked in our favour because we could just relax and play and you could see our rhythm gradually coming back. I was really pleased with the way we went out there and applied ourselves.

Although we were expected to beat the Riders because of the players they brought, Plymouth was going to be a different story — it’s one of the toughest venues to play in and they had a full house of 1,400.

But in the changing room before the game there was a good spirit which was something that had deserted us for a few weeks.

We started playing some really tough defence, moved the ball exceptionally well and shot superbly from the three-point line.

It was made to look very easy but we worked hard for that victory.

I think that’s one of our top three performances this season because of the way we played defensively and dismantled Plymouth offensively.

Six of our players reached double figures and we had 26 assists which meant we were sharing the ball.

I have been critical of the players in recent weeks but I can’t fault their effort now.

If you give some players time off they’ll maintain their levels but others need to be led and I have realised that.

I would rather us be very busy and working hard together with myself leading them instead of them having a day off and sitting around.

We’re productively busy at the moment and it seems to be paying off.

We are now working as hard as we were when we went on our eight-game unbeaten run in the league.

We’ll continue to do that and we’ll certainly go into these games against Surrey with a lot of confidence.