Power too strong for Cannons
LAST year’s Darwin Basketball Championship premiers Palmerston came back from a turbulent first half to eliminate Essington from the Challenge finals, the Power winning comfortably 122-88.
The Cannons took charge in the early stages, leading by nine points at halftime.
Essington coach Alex Hamriding was proud of his team’s efforts against a strong Palmerston side, despite the loss bringing an end to its season.
“We’ve got a new group, a younger group and for the first half we stuck it to who will likely be the eventual champions of the season,” he said.
But it was the Power that discovered its mojo in the second half, before dominating the last quarter.
American import guard Stefon Luckey stood out for the victors with 35 points, connecting on six three-pointers.
Palmerston captain Ben Streeter said while he was glad to win, his team would need to be better equipped moving into its preliminary final against Razzle this Saturday.
“Our intensity on the defensive end in the first half was pretty poor,” he said.
“We were stepping off to help a couple of their better shooters so we’ll learn from that and move on to the next game.”
“David Miles coming off the bench was really good for us in the defensive end and did the stuff that not many people like to do.”
Eagles (Anthony Golden 32 points, four three-pointers) are through to the final on April 6 after beating Razzle 93-67 on Friday night.
Lightning (Claire O’Bryan 27 points) enjoyed a stunning 75-42 win over 13-time reigning champions Tracy Village in the women’s major semifinal on Friday night. And Uni Rebels (Patricia Graham 24 points) won a thriller 67-66 over Ansett in the elimination semi-final last night.