HAVING walked through the Bounty Colts on Sunday night, the DC Jammers came up against the Pacesetters basketball club on Tuesday in a contest that was the most competitive in the Goodwill series.In the first quarter, the foreigners jumped to a fast start with 10 straight points to which the Pacesetters had no reply. However, battling back and putting together a few stops on the defensive end, Pacesetters restricted their American opponents to 26 points ending the quarter at 26-22 in favour of the visitors.
The dominance continued as they then scored 17 points in the second quarter on the back of Semaj Inge who had a game-high 24 while the Pacesetters looked flat and only scored 16 points to see the game 43-38, going into the half time interval.
It seemed to be another runaway performance by the Jammers until the men in purple and yellow turned it around in the third quarter. Hustle was the name of the game and Pacesetters out-hustled and out-scrapped the Jammers 19-15, ending the quarter 58-57 – Jammers up by one.
The fourth quarter started, and with about 6:45 minutes left in the game, the locals took the lead for the first time and got the crowd involved. Stephon Gillis knocked down a huge three-point shot and drew the foul for the four-point play. He converted it and the small crowd went wild. It looked like the Jammers were finally being matched.
Inge then erupted when Jammers got a stop and fed him the ball for the lane drive and thunderous dunk, to quell the crowd’s celebrations. The celebrations were then halted as Pacesetters couldn’t finish around the rim and Kevan Creppy turned in 8 straight points to take the game away from the locals. Inge and Winston Robinson had huge blocks to all but seal the deal. The defensive stops and offensive potency ended the game 82-75.
The Jammers’ final game will be played tonight at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall against a Georgetown All-Star team. The Jammers will be looking to sweep the games and prove the point of Guyana Amateur Basketball Federation (GABF) president Nigel Hinds.
Hinds had stated that the purpose of the tour was to expose the deficiency in Guyanese players’ games and show the difference in the level of skills.