Here Comes The Joy pt 1

My weekend started on Friday evening at the Greenbank Academy where the Everton Tigers were taking on the Leicester Riders. The Riders had Duane James back in their line-up and were pretty much at full strength.

Unfortunately for the Tigers there would be no Kevin Bell and no James Jones. Larkai was back on the floor but I have to admit he didn’t look 100%. I was not commentating on this game so I was able to take some pictures and actually enjoy the game.

The Riders struggled in this one but fought back to scare the living daylights out of the home team. In the end the Tigers would get the victory 94-89.

Jerome Gumbs went for 28 points , 9 rebounds, 6 assists and 3 steals for the Tigers while Jason Johnson led for the Riders with 23 points 11 rebounds and 3 steals. Gumbs had played every minute of the game.

This had been a really enjoyable game and I suggest we keep an eye on both of these teams as they will be in the mix at the end of the season.

One of the big talking points of the night was Trey Moore who still has not arrived in the UK. The word is that there are some problems with his Visa and they are hoping to resolve that soon. If and when the Tigers finally get Moore in a Tigers’ vest, this team will definately be a contender for honours.

The other talking point was that this was BBL Cup Final weekend and 12 months ago it was the Tigers who were getting ready for their first Final, where they would take on the Plymouth Raiders. In that game they would destroy the Raiders and win by the biggest margin ever. Unfortunately in the past few days, they had to return the Cup to the BBL where it could be prepared for the next winners. Was it going to the the Jets or the Sharks…Only time will tell.

Saturday and I am back on the road to Leeds Carnegie where I am commentating on both the Women and Men’s teams. Both Carnegie outfits went into the Christmas break on the back of defeats and it would be interesting to see their mood for this first game back. As I arrived the Carnegie 11 team were playing against Sefton and were trailing. Although Carnegie put up a good fight under new Head Coach Voise Winters they would go down by a score-line of 61-67.

And so it is time for the Women to take to the floor and they were in for a battle. In town were Nottingham Wildcats and they were up for this one. Carnegie got off to a flyer and it didn’t look as if the Wildcats could live with them.

At the end of the 1st the score was 28-14 in favour of home team and all was looking good for Head Coach James Bambury and his team.

Into the second and things began to go wrong for Carnegie as Loui Hall picked up 2 fouls and had to sit. This gave the Wildcats a chance to cut into the lead. At the half the score was 39-31 with Carnegie still on the high side.

In that second quarter Wildcats star Sabra Wrice gave us a taste of what was to come. She had 9 points in the quarter to take her total to 11.

For Carnegie Ray Kahlil was doing a good job handling the ball along with Keesha Tate, However Carnegie would score only 11 points in the second while giving up 17.

Now on to the 3rd and the writing was on the wall for Carnegie. The home team would score only 3 buckets from the field and 6 from the line. Hall had not scored since the early exchanges of this game. Meanwhile Anne Marie Powell and Wrice would fill their boots.

Powell had 6 in the 3rd while Wrice would go for 14 to take her total to 25. Believe it or not, there was still another quarter to go. The score at the end of the 3rd was 51-53 in favour of the Wildcats. Wrice was killing!

Into the final stanza and although Jo Clayden and Fanny Feher would do good work this was again about the visitors and about Wrice. She would finish the game with 35 points and the Wildcats would head back to Nottingham with a fantastic victory under their belts. The final score was 66 to Carnegie and 72 to Nottingham.

Now it was time for this final game of another Carnegie Day of Basketball and the D1 Men would take on the reigning Champions Reading Rockets. The Rockets are finding their feet again following the departure of their Head Coach Dave Titmuss to BBL team Worthing Thunder.

Oh BABY! this game was a joy to behold. Great performances, great plays and a sensational ending. Unfortunately, space and time constraints mean that I am unable to go into this one blow by blow but suffice to say Fenyn and Supola were awesome for the home team while Kenny Saunders was a joy for the visitors. Carnegie would run out winners by 1 point 73-72 but they will know that they got out of jail.

The scores were tied at 64 in the 4 and again at 66. The top scorers were Fenyn (pictured above) with 23 and Supola with 18 for Carnegie and Saunders for Reading with 21. This was a wonderful game full of excitement and a visiting coach who was annimated to say the least and boy was he loud!.

The next game for me was going to be the BBL Cup Final at the NIA Birmingham and I have to say I was really looking forward to this.

Later

Mike S