Nathan Coulter-Nile had the best night of his BBL career, taking four wickets to help the Melbourne Stars beat the Brisbane Heat by six wickets in Canberra.
Coulter-Nile took career-best Twenty20 figures of 4-10 to help have Brisbane all out for 125, before Glenn Maxwell and Hilton Cartwright guided the Stars home with 17 balls to spare.
But it wasn't as easy as it looked, after debutants Xavier Bartlett (1-28) and Jack Wood (2-28) had last season's finalists slumping to 3-34 after 6.1 overs.
But it was there Maxwell and Cartwright (46 from 42 balls) steadied the ship, claiming the bonus-point for leading at the 10-over mark on the way.
Maxwell in particular hit the accelerator with 46 off 26 balls, taking legspinner Wood for three sixes over the legside before being bowled trying to reverse hit him.
Coulter-Nile was still the hero, adding two run outs off his own bowling to go with his wickets.
The allrounder claimed the key scalp of Chris Lynn for 20, who played within himself for the most part with the exception of a six off Adam Zampa over square leg.
Coulter-Nile also removed hard-hitting opener Max Bryant, caught behind to a good low catch from Ben Dunk.
The last two wickets for Coulter-Nile came late, removing Jimmy Peirson (18) and Matt Kuhnemann (0), and running out Wood and Bartlett at the non-strikers' end.
Pakistan quick Dilbar Hussain finished with 2-25, and was at one stage on a hat-trick only for it to be blocked out by Peirson.
Cartwright left a high watermark for run out of the tournament, removing Englishman Dan Lawrence with a direct hit from deep midwicket for 8.
Meanwhile, Brisbane were left to rue being too tentative at times in a team that has already been written off by critics with Tom Cooper (26) their only player to pass 20 with the bat.
