TEARS flowed on day two of the National Schools Basketball Festival (NSBF) at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall last Monday as KwaKwani Secondary, St Stanislaus College (Saints), the University of Guyana and JC Chandisingh all recorded dramatic victories. 

With a spot on Guyana’s Inter-Guiana Games (IGG) team and top prizes and bragging rights up for grabs, losing was not an option for any of the teams, and hearts were certainly broken.
Marian Academy lost to JC Chandisingh 26–29 in a low-scoring encounter but by far the most entertaining match of the evening.
With scores tied at 26 points, Kevin Deolall (10 points) buried a three-point shot with four seconds remaining to give his side victory.
Marian Academy had played from behind for a greater part of the game and should blame their poor shooting at the free-throw line and silly turnovers for the loss.
Behind Travis Belgrave’s game-high 22 points, Saints had to work hard to stop Mackenzie High, beating them 41–37 in another gruelling clash.
Belgrave had to battle Daniel Anthony of Mackenzie High who finished the game with 19 points, but the load was too much for the Linden point guard to carry and folded to Saints who picked up their first win of the 2014 tournament.
Point guard Jonathan Pooran and his backcourt sidekick Daniel Ramlagan each netted 14 points that saw the University of Guyana (UG) edge out Bishops’ High 48-42 in a nail-biting game that could have gone either way.
Bishops’ played from behind but, led by their star player Marvin Durant (14 points), they were able to climb back into the game.
Durant’s usual supporter Daniel Haynes was not at his best, scoring only eight points but was a beast on the glass, grabbing 13 rebounds.
Kwakwani Secondary continue to look like the team to beat at this year’s NSBF as they stamped their authority on St Rose’s High, whom they thrashed 68-33.
Leonard Primo netted a game-high 25 points and grabbed 11 rebounds while Stanton Rose chipped in 13 points, five rebounds and four assists.
St Rose’s usual go-to guy Nathan Saul was out-matched and scored only 16 points which was not enough to stop the men from the Berbice River community in Region 10.
The Festival is the culmination of six weeks of Regional Conference Tournaments, organised in six separate zones, after which the best Under-14, U-16, U-19 and girls’ teams are invited to the highly anticipated eight-day competition for National accolades.
The NSBF is a collaborative effort between Youth Basketball Guyana and the National Sports Commission and is used to select the Inter-Guiana Games basketball teams.