YBL U15 South
Bournville Bears 68 Vs 73 Leadonites
(Q1: 13-13 / Q2: 15-20 / Q3: 19-17 / Q4: 21-23)
After last week’s
disappointing home defeat to Spartans, Leadonites Basketball travelled to Dame
Elizabeth Cadbury College to play Bournville Bears in what turned out to be a
thrilling match to watch. The lead swapped sides eight times before the Ledbury
boys finally pushed their noses ahead with 90 seconds of the last quarter left
to play.
In the only two previous
matches between these two clubs, both friendlies, the bears had won out
convincingly with the last encounter finishing 79-21 to the Birmingham club.
Star of the match for
Bourneville was Stove who hit a game high 40 points that started with a
3-pointer in the second minute of the match. A free-throw from Teo
Calvo-Whitelegg got the Leadonites underway before he scored again with a
lay-up to equal the scores. Further scores from George Robb and JJ Hobson gave
Leadonites their first lead of the match. Sam Nicholls extended the lead in the
seventh minute with Hobson and Michael French also scoring. But more baskets
from Miller, getting tagged for his third foul of the quarter, and Stove again left
the end of quarter scores level at 13-apiece.
Bournville opened the second
quarter scoring as they had the first when Antrobes dropped a 3-pointer in the
opening minute before Stove stretched their lead out further with another two.
Hobson missed his four free-throw of the match before Josh Spriggs caught the
rebound and scored his first points of the match. Stove reasserted Bears’ lead
to 20-15 before a mini scoring spree from Leadonites with baskets from Spriggs,
French, Alessio Miccio and a Calvo-Whitelegg single gave them a slender lead. The two sides traded baskets but with
Leadonites easing ahead through a combination of the defensive work under the
hoop of Ethan Wheeler, Spriggs and Calvo-Whitelegg and scores from Robb, Spriggs
and Calvo-Whitelegg before Spriggs finished the first half with a flurry of
three close range scores to give the away team a half-time lead of 33-28.
Six third quarter baskets
from Spriggs, aided with scores from Hobson (3pts) and Calvo-Whitelegg were enough
to hold onto the lead despite being outscored 19-17 in the period to finish the
third 50 points to the host’s 47.
Spriggs limped out of the
match with a suspected dead-leg early in the fourth and Bears took advantage as
they overtook scores from Joseph Fisher and Hobson to snatch back the lead in
the third minute and then proceeded to run up a 58 to 54 lead by the end of the
fourth minute. A score from Robb stemmed the flow and Spriggs was able to
re-join the fray in the fifth minute and scored soon after. A free throw and a
two from Calvo-Whitelegg plus another free-throw from Hobson got Leadonites
level at 62-all.
With one of their main
re-bounders off the court hurt disaster struck when Miller fouled out of the
match with three minutes to play. Despite this set-back Bears forged out to a
four-point lead with just two minutes left on the game-clock. Two quick-fire
close range baskets from Spriggs and another two from Hobson regained the lead
for Leadonites with one minute left to play. A converted free-throw from
Calvo-Whitelegg were iced when team captain French rebounded two late missed
free-throws to score on each and despite a last ditch score from Stove with
only seconds to go the Herefordshire club chalked up their third win out of
four for the season.
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