Courts Pacesetters, Pepsi Sonics secure wins on opening night

By Rawle Toney

The Georgetown Amateur Basketball Association (GABA) third division basketball league sponsored by Lens Craft opened on Saturday evening at the Burnham Basketball Court with Pepsi Sonics and Courts Pacesetter taking first night honours.

Playing in the opening game of the double header, Courts Pacesetters defeated Dynas Ravens 78-72 in a game that went into to triple overtime.

It was evident from the start of the game that both teams were eagerly awaiting the start of the tournament since both played with determination to win.

After constantly going back and forth on offense and defense, the game came down to the wire with the scores tied at 51.

Pacesetters had the game in hand when power forward Marlon Anderson was fouled and went to the line with five seconds left in the game.

But he missed both free throws sending the game into its first overtime.

Pacesetters took charge of the first extra time but Ravens point guard Binium Norton, who was the backbone of his team’s offense, stepped up to the challenge and down 59-57 with time was running out, he took an acrobatic shot that was good on the buzzer to send the game into the second overtime.

The see-saw battle continued throughout and just like Norton did for Ravens in the second over time so did Dillon Daniels do for the Pacesetter when they were down 64-62 and his last second shot sent the game into third extra time.

But it was from here that Pacesetters made it clear that enough was enough and took the game away from Ravens allowing them to score only three more points.

The game ended 72-67 for Pacesetters.

Travis Williams and Anderson were the primary scorers for the winners netting 18 and 16 points respectively while Norton led all scorers with a game-high 36 points. His team-mate Tyron Hamid chipped in with 13.

Meanwhile, in the second game of the evening, Pepsi Sonics narrowly defeated Bounty Colts 50-46 to make a positive start to the championship.  From the start, it was evident that Sonics came out with a game plan to out play the Colts every second of the game.

The Colts played well but their efforts just weren’t good enough to stop the Sonics. For the victors Kevin Tute had 14 points while Drexel Aaron supported with 11.

Dexter Walcott had the game-high 18 points and Reyon Rhobe nine for Colts.

The competition will be played every Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the Burnham Court and the GABA said it will play the first division league simultaneously with the third division competition.