Manuel Pena Garces’ men started their league campaign with a win on Saturday evening as they ran out 72-58 winners at Bradford Dragons.

It was a slow opening quarter but both sides found their feet in the second period, before Rockets pulled away in the third and fourth quarter with some incisive attacking play.

Alez Zurn and Emmanuel Campi Garcia top scored for Rockets with 16 points, while Deion Turman also contributed with 13 points.

It was the perfect response from Rockets, who had crashed out of the National Trophy the weekend before.

And things got better for Pena Garces’ side when they ran out 80-72 winners against Kent Crusaders in overtime of the rearranged National Cup match on Sunday evening.

It was a tough test for Rockets, against a side that had beaten them by 11 points in the National Trophy recently, but they came through it to progress to the third round of the National Cup.

Rockets had a ten point run in the first period after keeping up an intensity that surprised Kent, but the hosts dug in and trailed just 17-13 at the break.

A few clashes occurred early in the second period resulting in Sergi Guardia being called for an unsportsmanlike foul and a technical foul, before Matt Davis hit a superb treble from the corner and got Rockets going again after the delays from the early fracas.

Kent were battling well and causing problems of their own, and they narrowly took the quarter to trail just 34-32 at the break.

Rockets were out of the traps with speed and quality in the third quarter as they took it 22-12 with Zurn hitting three trebles en route to Pena Garces’ side extending their lead to 56-44.

Kent went on a 10-0 run at the start of the final period but Turman from the line and the ever present Zurn going coast to coast kept Rockets up by six points.

The hosts were determined though, and levelled the scores with two minutes to go at 63-63.

But a Guillermo Sanchez three point play and a steal and finish by Adria Baiget gave Rockets breathing space of a five point advantage with less than a minute to go.

It was end-to-end and Kent fought back to level the score at 68-68 and force the game into overtime.

But with a place in the quarter final at stake, Rockets were in no mood to lose their grip on the game and excelled in the overtime period to take it 12-4, giving them victory against a tough Crusaders side.

Rockets will be looking to build on those victories when they travel to Essex Leopards on Friday evening (8pm t/o) before welcoming newly -promoted Derby Trailblazers to the Rivermead Leisure Complex on Sunday (4pmt/o).

Pena Garces was pleased with Rockets getting back to winning ways, and paid tribute to the character of his side to record back-to-back away wins from two tough, testing trips.

He said: “I am really pleased with last weekend’s performances and credit to the players they did a fantastic job to win both games.

“I truly believed that we could win both games and we showed the character and willingness to get competing and challenging for the whole time and that is something we will definitely need this season. The players rose to the obstacles and overall had a really good weekend and this is now something we must build on.”

He continued: “We play two very competitive teams in the space of three days and the visit to Leopards on Friday will be a really stern test for us especially after the very competitive Trophy game at home last month.

“We need to focus on this first and then turn our attentions to Derby on Saturday before we play them on Sunday.

“They have had a really good start to life in Division One and will again be another difficult proposition for us but we must be confident that we can win both games and keep up the good start to the league campaign.”