HOOPERS, CATHERINE HALL ALL-STARS MEET IN BEST OF 3
The best-of-three
National Basketball League-West final between Hoopers
and Catherine Hall All-stars will get underway this
Saturday at the Montego Bay Cricket Club starting at
6:30 pm.
The finalists advanced to the play-offs after topping
the point's tables with 14 points, the same as Granville
Jaguars who lost out on a place in the finals with an
inferior
goal-difference.
Ali Thompson (left) tries to prevent Sav Hawks' Maurice
Rodriques from making an easy inbound pass in a recent Flow NBL-West
return round game played at the Montego Bay Cricket
Club. (Photo: Paul Reid)
Hoopers, who beat relegated Sav Hawks 63-42 on Sunday to
snap a two-game losing streak, topped the standings with
a goal-difference of 10 followed by All-stars on minus
two and Granville, who beat Inner-city Avalanche 93-81
in double overtime in a game marred by violence,
finished with minus eight.
Game two of the final will be played next Tuesday at the
same venue starting at 6:30 pm and if necessary, Game
Three will be played next Saturday at the National
Indoor Centre.
Meanwhile, the regular season ended on a sour note on
Sunday as an incident of violence marred what was an
exciting game between Granville Jaguars, and Inner-city
Avalanche, which took two overtimes to be decided.
The game was in the first period of overtime when an
ugly incident caused the first of two interruptions.
A number of players had gone for a rebound under the
Avalanche basket and the ball was slapped away from
Granville's Leroy Lawrence.
Lawrence then approached Godfrey Rodriques menacingly
but was dragged away by teammates. He went to his bench
and then walked close to Rodriques and was again dragged
away by teammates but returned to slap the Avalanche
player with an open hand in the face.
The attack combined with an accident in the second
period of overtime when Granville's Dave Black fell
heavily after a mis-timed attempt at an interception by
Dwayne Johns saw him fall heavily on the ground, took
all the energy out of the game.
Up to then the teams, despite several errors late in
regulation time, had kept the crowd entertained and on
the edge of their seats.
Avalanche led by as many as 10 points early in the
fourth quarter but Granville who started sluggish,
steadily chipped away at the lead with Lawrence scoring
nine straight points of his 23 to bring his team back in
the game, and a three-pointer from Black with just over
three minutes to go, gave them the lead at 62-61.
After having game-high scorer Oneil Clarke and Cleon
Morgan foul out within 30 seconds of each other and
being reduced to five players, Avalanche tied up the
scores at 64-all to force the first overtime.
In the first overtime, Avalanche players missed a number
of free throws with Johns missing four and Mikey
Haughton missed both of his after Lawrence was thrown
out of the game.
Haughton, however, made amends by making a three-point
shot with eight seconds to go to tie up the scores at
73-all and force a second overtime.
Lawrence, who will be summoned to face the disciplinary
committee, led the scoring for Granville with 23 points
and 16 rebounds, Huwayne Blake scored 21 points and had
11 rebounds while Black scored 14 points and had six
assists.
Clarke led Avalanche with 24 points, 13 rebounds and
five steals; Haughton scored 16 points and had 14
assists; Johns scored 13 points; Sanchez Campbell scored
11 points, while Morgan and Steven James both scored
nine points.
In the nightcap, Hoopers - who had lost back-to-back
games against Granville and Catherine Hall, cruised to
an easy win over Hawks who played without the
influential Dellon Hodges.
Andre Morgan came off the bench to lead Hoopers scoring
with 15 points, Neil Samuels had 10 points, Dennis Brown
scored five points and grabbed 12 rebounds, while Toussaint Williams scored four points and got 11
rebounds.
Richard Chambers, who had scored 22 points the previous
night in their loss to Catherine Hall, again led Hawks,
scoring 24 points while Maurice Rodriques scored nine
points and had 10 rebounds.
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