The Mercantile Basketball League continued last evening as LOLC registered an easy win against MAS and Seylan had a tough fight against HSBC. Read on to see how it happened.
Peoples Team of the MSBA League 2017 – Vote
The 27th Edition of the Mercantile Basketball League will commence during the third week of June.
Full-time: Seylan Bank- 51 HSBC- 60
LOLC vs MAS (D Division)
LOLC was the first to score following an interception that was converted successfully. MAS struggled to get through the LOLC defence and make an attempt at scoring which allowed LOLC to take an early lead in the game. MAS employed a man to man defence, which wasn’t very effective as they failed to keep up with their opponents resulting in LOLC getting wide open scoring opportunities. Whilst LOLC, on the other hand, was comparatively faster and intercepted many of the MAS passes and converted them successfully into fast break opportunities. MAS didn’t have a great time on the offense either with many of their shots failing to connect resulting in them trailing behind LOLC by 30 points as they went into lemons.
Half-time: LOLC- 49 MAS- 19
The second half was no better for MAS as they continued to struggle to keep up with their opponents as it began to look like a one-sided affair. LOLC was getting one basket after the other while MAS still failed to get their shot accuracy on par although on occasion they were able to score a few points through layups. LOLC had a better all-around team as they penetrated the MAS defence well with a couple of well-timed passes allowing them to secure an easy victory.
Full-time: LOLC- 81 MAS- 42
The coach of the winning team had this to say after the match: “I don’t believe that any match is ever easy but I do believe that we played well today with very few mistakes and good coordination on the court which led to our victory. There are a lot of tough teams in this division but we hoped that we will be able to win since this was our first game and it did go well for us.”
Seylan Bank vs HSBC (C Division)
Seylan Bank drew first blood and quickly moved into a man to man defence which was the same defensive strategy used by HSBC. Both teams had tight defence making scoring a difficult task for either side. During the first half when HSBC began to take a slightly substantial lead Seylan switched to a full-court press to try and reduce the deficit. HSBC kept control of the game through fast breaks and although the full court press helped reduce the deficit, the HSBC defence was too tight for Seylan to penetrate and turn the tables. Towards the final few minutes of the half when the deficit was reduced to 4 points Seylan eased up on their full court press as they trailed behind HSBC going into halftime.
Half-time: Seylan Bank- 28 HSBC- 32
Seylan came into the second half with strong motivation intercepting more passes and taking more shots although to their bad luck many of these didn’t connect. HSBC, on the other hand, continued to use the same formula of top notch defence to maintain control of the game. Although Seylan did turn the tables on HSBC at one point, their glory was short-lived. Even though HSBC was in control of the game it was still close with Seylan staying close behind trying to reduce the deficit. Unfortunately for the Seylan team, they lost track of the foul count giving their opponents a few opportunities at the line to keep the lead. In the final minute of the game, HSBC lost a crucial post player to an injury yet their lead was sufficient enough to take home the victory as Seylan ran out of time to close the gap.
The coach of the winning team had this to say to ThePapare.com : “We had a 2-week break since our first match, in which we were able to squeeze in some good practice sessions and now the team is in good form. It was definitely a tough game for us especially since a few of our players were out injured, but we’re hoping to recover soon and do better in the next match.”
