Ravens to clash with rivals Pacesetters in finals
IT’s exactly the final the pundits predicted at the start of the tournament and thanks to some clinical display of the game between the two teams: Ravens and Courts Pacesetters will meet in the finals of the Guyana Amateur Basketball Federation (GABF) National Club Championships. The tournament which is being sponsored by Digicel and Ansa McAl (Mackeson) continued on Saturday night at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall and saw Ravens overcoming a spirited fight from Maccabees 72 – 56 while Pacesetters trashed Scorpions 73 – 48 in two crowd pleasing matches.
Playing the opening encounter, Maccabees seemed poised for an upset; or so their supporters thought since they walked with horns and other noise making obstacles that certainly set the perfect tone for a classic show down and the first half scores reflected their winning intentions or an upset of the city’s number one team.
Ravens led 22-14 at the end of the first quarter with the newly acquired Akeem ‘The Dream’ Kanhai marshalling things in the back court along with Yusuf Edghill while the front court was manned by Dwayne ‘Brown Sugar’ Roberts and Ryan Gullen.
But poor officiating caused the game to be played like nursery school children with the referees applying a ‘see but don’t touch’ grip on the game, by simply policing the game which incensed the many supporters who came out to see a free flowing game.
The fans of both teams certainly had a collective voice in calling on the ‘ref’ to “let the game play” but nonetheless, Hodayah Stewart (Maccabees Captain) and his troop went on a scoring spree which saw them leading by one point at the end of the first half (32-31).
So, what did the person classed as one of the best coaches in Guyana (Darcell Harris) do having the best offensive flowing team in Guyana? Well, its simple, just tighten up on defence and use the game’s top player to his full potential and the game was a wrap!
Kanhai, who finished with a game high 16 points along with Ryan Stephaney who ended the night with 13 points and Edghill (12) were basically unmatched as they not only shut out Maccabees but also spearheaded Ravens’ scoring rampage.
Junior National guard Yannick Dundus poured in 14 points for his team who were out scored 23 – 5 in the third quarter which ended 54 – 37.
The final period changed nothing for the best as Maccabees had to contend with watching Kanhai explode on them since there was no one to contain him one-on-one and Gullen, to do the same, while Roberts who only had four points, sneered almost everything that came off of the glass and made sure it was converted to an easy basket.
Kanhai has seemingly silenced his critics with his leading role in the team’s win by taking over the game when called upon by Harris and was a factor on defence picking up at least 5 steals and getting well over 10 rebounds.
Apart from Dundus, only Hodayah Stewart was able getting into double digits, scoring 10 while Devon Cameron with nine was the other top scorer.
In the second game of the double header, Scorpions replicated Maccabees performance as they too held Georgetown’s number two ranked side to the task, first trailing 16 – 17 in the first quarter and then only being down 28 – 31 at half time.
But Pacesetters Coach Robert ‘Bobby’ Cadogon used his height and speed advantage against Scorpion well since they only relied heavily on the expertise of former Junior National Point Guard Shelroy Thomas.
Thomas was his side’s top scorer of the night with 12 points since the last game’s ‘go-to-guy’ Marvis Hilliman, was shut out of the game and only managed to score four points.
Point guard Travis Burnett and centre Jermaine Hamilton both shot 16 points while Naylon Loncke 12 and Stephon Gillis eight were the other primary scorers.
The grand final will take place on Saturday and certainly Pacesetters would want to end Ravens’ destructive run since the team who call themselves the ‘Orange Men’ only lost one game in almost a year and a half.
