All-Stars go close in a national semi-final
Coach Shane O’Meara has praise for players after their defeat to UCC Blue Demons in President’s Cup semi-final at Cork’s Parochial Hall
THEY may have missed out on place in the President’s Cup final, but last Saturday’s semi-final performance from EJ Sligo All-Stars left head coach Shane O’Meara and his assistant, Glen Monaghan, enthused for the remainder of the season. EJ Sligo All-Stars lost by nine points, 73-64, to UCC Blue Demons at Cork city’s Parochial Hall but there was substance to the semi-finalists’ display.
They are currently top of the Basketball Ireland’s Men’s Division
One North Conference and, if they can maintain their progress there could end up in the season’s play-offs. EJ Sligo All-Stars return to North Conference action this Sunday afternoon – they are away to bottom side LYIT, who are winless after eight games.
Still, it would have been brilliant to have had a President’s Cup final to look forward to – EJ Sligo All-Stars were finalists in this competition five years ago.
UCC Blue Demons started strongly, putting nine points on the board before EJ Sligo All-Stars established themselves.
The Sligo club were left with a lot to do at half-time.
At the stage they trailed by 14 points, 38-24, against opponents who were led by Ireland men’s basketball team captain Kyle Hosford, with Tala Fam Thiam a scoring menace. Thiam shot 31 points in total.
The main scorers for EJ Sligo AllStars were Zack Powell (15 points), Keith Jordan Jr (13 points) and Jamie Hayes (9 points). Hayes wasn’t quite 100% because of an injury and Cian Lally was similarly hampered.
Foul trouble also limited Zack Powell’s input, although Powell got some key points late in the fourth quarter as EJ Sligo All-Stars got the deficit down to a point, 63-62.
But UCC Blue Demons finished with a flourish to seal a place in the decider against Drogheda Wolves, who won their semi-final earlier on Saturday against IT Carlow Basketball.
“I don’t think it was a nine-point game,” said Shane O’Meara.
“It was a tight affair at times but we never tied up the game and going nine points down early on didn’t help.
“We didn’t get the rub of the green, shots didn’t fall for us and a few calls didn’t go our way.”
He added: “We had them under pressure in the last quarter but we just didn’t have that bit of luck to get over the line.”
“It does feel like a game that we could have won. I have come away from games that we won actually more disappointed than I was last Saturday.”
“What I saw from the players was a hunger and how they’ve grown as a team since the season started.”
Prior to the fixture O’Meara was anxious to know how strong UCC Blue Demons would actually be and whether their prowess would be a good indicator of the South Conference. “There’s a chance we could meet them against in the Division One play-offs. I would be confident that if we played them [UCC Blue Demons] 10 times that we’d win half of these games – it is unfortunate that we didn’t get the result last Saturday. We were well able to win that game ” he added.
“We scored 21 three-pointers against Malahide last month but we only scored five last weekend.”
Update
EJ Sligo All-Stars (v UCC Blue Demons): Oisin O’Reilly (9pts), Ryan Young, Zack Powell (15pts), Philip Hamilton, Mattie McHale, Keith Jordan Jr (13pts), Cian Lally (8pts), Eoghan Donaghy (3pts), Josh Henry, Sean Snee, Aidan O’Shea, Jamie Hayes (9pts), Matthew Donnellan, Conor Byrne