A much – anticipated battle looms at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall tonight when old friends from Courts Pacesetters and Bounty Colts meet in the feature quarter-final game of the Next Level Entertainment nation-wide first division basketball tournament.
The quarter-final round of the tournament commences tonight with Berbice All- Stars taking on Beepat’s Scorpions in the first game from 7pm. The Courts Pacesetters vs Bounty Colts game is expected to begin at 9pm.
A few players from the Pacesetters unit took trades last year to fill vacant slots in the Bounty Colts line-up. The most productive of the Courts players traded to Colts has been shooting guard, Triston Lake.
The Colts were anxiously awaiting an opportunity to avenge their crushing defeat by the Pacesetters in the Georgetown first-division league tournament last December; tonight they will have that chance.
The team will continue to rely on the strength of its middle and lower- post players including big men, Gavin Beeram, Dane Kendall and Kelvin Simon for sufficient defensive pressure.
Colts’ guards will have to learn how to rotate the ball from the top of the key to rival the swift pace of the Courts’ team. Colts’ point guard, Kayode Murray will be the likely candidate to ‘mark’ the speedy Courts’ guard, Stephon ‘Penny’ Henry.
The depth of the Colts’ bench will be put to the test tonight as the Courts’ team, with a barrage of new recruits, possesses a very deep bench-fresh legs. Courts experimented with their bench against the lowly rated East Coast in their first round game.
The Courts’ bench experiment with all the players ‘getting a run’ against East Coast is not likely against Colts. There will be more clear-cut tactics from the very experienced Courts’ coach, Robert ‘Bobby’ Cadogan.
The Georgetown number-one seeded Courts Pacesetters will have in its arsenal, shooting guard, Stephon Gillis, forward Royston Siland, forward Naylon Loncke and forward Desmond Chin with a stiff bench.
Colts will hope that Georgetown Amateur Basketball Association (GABA) coach-of- the-year, Phillip George can pull something out the bag with his years of experience at the first-division level.
It should be smooth sailing for Scorpions in the first game as they face a Berbice team that is more or less a ‘make-up’ team since the degeneration of the sport in the ancient county in recent years.
To beat Scorpions, Berbice will have to pull off a major upset, but things have been going Berbice’s way so far since the team advanced to the quarter-final stage with a walk-over from their scheduled game against Ravens in the first round.
Scorpions outlasted Raiders to advance in Linden last Saturday. The athletic centre, Carl Jackman, will man the team’s middle with shooting guard Sheldon Braithwaite and guard Darren Gordon offering support from the top.
Darren Thomas is expected to replace David Green in the starting line-up tonight for Scorpions’ owing to a back injury sustained by Green. Coming off the bench for Scorpions is the former Colts lead guard, Trevor Mc Leod.
