Royals and Raiders to battle in final
THE Retrieve Raiders and Victory Valley Royals are down to contest the final of the Linden Amateur Basketball Association’s 2011/12 Under-23 club championship tomorrow following semi-final wins over Kashif and Shanghai Kings and GTS Half Mile Bulls last Wednesday night at the Mackenzie Sports Club hard court. Playing in the first game the Victory Valley Royals overcame the Bulls by 10 points, coming away with 70-60 victory after scores were 16-15 for the Bulls at the end of the first quarter, before the Royals took control to hold a three-point lead (30-27) at halftime 30-27.
At the end of the third quarter, the Bulls were in charge with a 44-43 scoreline, before the Royals accelerated to their eventual victory, with their top scorer being Chris Williams who followed his 76 points in the previous match, with a game-high 29 points, while Marlon Pollydore and Dave Hopkinson offered support with 11 and 10 points respectively.
Michael Turner with 19 points and Keon Cameron with 17 were the top shooters for GTS Half Mile Bulls.
In the other semifinal Retrieve Raiders prevailed against the Kashif and Shanghai Kings 53-46 after being down 27-19 at halftime and coming back to level the scores at the end of the pivotal third quarter at 36.
Deval Wilson stepped up offensively and led the Raiders with 15 points while their captain Omar Sam had 14 and Geoffrey Larose contributed 10 for the winners, with Orin Rose scoring a game-high 21 for the Kings and received support from Clifton Halley who scored 10.
Jump-ball time for tomorrow’s final is 20:30hrs and will be preceded by the third-place playoff which gets under way at 18:30hrs between the two losing semifinalists.