Defending champs Horizon off to hot start in Elite League

DEFENDING CHAMPIONS Elite Horizon continued their impressive start to the 2023 Elite 1 Caribbean Basketball League as they defeated the Elite Storm 97-95 on Wednesday night inside the National Arena to extend their winning streak to four and remain as the only undefeated team in the ongoing championships.

Trevor Thompson’s 22 points, along with 18 points from Asaad Woods, led the offensive charge for the Cleon Morgan-coached Horizon team. In the night’s other fixture the Elite Waves, on the back of an explosive game high 42 points from Cameron Buchanan, stopped the Elite Rivers 104-97 as the latter suffered their fourth straight defeat of the championships despite being up by as many as 20 points at the halftime interval.

The head coach of the in-form Horizon team, said that he was pleased with his team’s performance so far as he was seeing elements of what was taught in training being executed on the court.

“Based on what we would have practised in training we would have seen some of those elements being executed. As the other games progress, we will be looking to improve on the other areas eventually. Defensively, we are one of the better teams, the offensive was always there because we have players with talents all around and they can shoot and dribble the ball very well,” said Morgan.

Despite the 4-0 start to the championships, coach Morgan believes the group can still get better as he is fully aware of the areas that are of concern to both himself and the coaching staff.

“Based on how we play defence there’s a little struggle in terms of how we play the pick-and-roll. In the pick-and-roll, we are a little confused as to when to go over the screen, when to go under or when to go through the screen. We will be going back to the drawing board and based on the observations that’s one of things we will be working on so that we can get the defence up to the level that we want it to be,” Morgan said.

The Elite 1 Caribbean Basketball League will continue tomorrow evening at the National starting at 6 p.m. when the undefeated Elite Horizon square off against the Elite Waves, followed by the Elite Storm versus the Elite Rivers at 8 p.m.