Last-gasp woe sees Lapwings fall to Falcons
WHAT was hoped to be an enjoyable feast of basketball for the Stockport Club at Reddish Vale’s Ball Hall, on Saturday quickly went drastically wrong.
Both Lapwings teams lost badly and the Falcons senior team, having led the whole of the game, lost in the final mini second of the game.
At least those who stayed long enough to watch the U18 Men, witnessed the one win of the afternoon.
The Lapwings U14’s found themselves facing a much taller and more mature looking Wildcats team from Nottingham, and were unable to cope with their pace and height losing 33-62.
Against Sheffield Hatters second team Stockport made a slow start, failing to find a score with the first six shots they put up.
After a low scoring first period, things livened up a little with points coming from Collins and Clayden, and Stockport finished the first half just six points behind at 23-29.
Within three minutes of the third quarter the score closed to just three, and Stockport, although looking at times disorganised, were hanging on. Waking to the situation Hatters turned up the heat, and in three minutes they racked up 13 points without reply.
Now eleven behind the Lapwings found themselves on the end of an aggressive full court press, and lost possession too many times, costing them another fourteen points with only two in reply, and Sheffield coasted to a comfortable win at 70-44.
Stockport’s defence was too flat footed, and never had control of their own boards, with Collins the smallest player on court taking the most rebounds. Silikas and Collins ran themselves in to the ground but were short on help to get them to basket. Only Clayden scored consistently , and in spite of hitting only one of her five free throws she topped the scoring with 18 points.
The Falcons match with Myerscough College stated evenly with Stockport maintaining a slight edge, pulling out a five point lead after ten minutes.
Strong rebounding from Travis and Plummer in defence, combined with some hard driving from Walton, and a continued presence of Plummer on the offensive boards kept Stockport in the driving seat, taking the half time score to 40-32.
At the start of the second half Myerscough scored the first four points, only for Stockport to reply with four of their own. The visitors came back with nine in a row to lead by one point, but Stockport rallied again and ended the period ahead 55-50.
In the final crucial period Myerscough pulled back again to only one point with less than three minutes to play.
Missed free throws allowed the college to pull level at 69 all with less than a minute to play.
With the clock showing only17 seconds to go Cumming, took the home team back in front hitting one of two free throws.
A possible chance four seconds later to take the lead to three points was missed, and Myerscough surged down court making an opening for Kanmu to crash the board with a spectacular score as the final buzzer sounded.
It was so tight that had there been a Video Assessment available it would have had to for slow motion scrutiny, for it was debatable whether the ball had left his hand before the buzzer sounded.
It was certainly through the net by the time the buzzer ended, and the game was lost 70-71. Walton [17], Curley [16] and Plummer with 14 point and16 rebounds led the team.
The U18 men played last of all and this time produced the right result against Cheshire Phoenix.
The foundation for their win came in the second quarter of the match, when the Falcons went from two points behind, to lead 42-26 at half time.
Although Phoenix came back strongly in the second half, Stockport hung on to win 67-60.