The 2012/13 EBL season began this weekend with a blowout, a shock result and an overtime game.
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Tees Valley Mohawks were the story of the first weekend as they defeated reigning league, cup and playoff champions Essex Leopards
83-81 in Middlesbrough.
The game was close throughout and Leopards thought they had tied it up in the closing seconds, but player/coach Robert Youngblood's basket was ruled as a two pointer, alowing Mohawks to sneak the win.
Three players topped the twenty point mark for Steve Butler's Mohawks with Jamie Kohn leading the way with a 25 point, 11 rebound double-double. Jorge Ebanks had 24 and David Hanson 22 as Mohawks won despite shooting only 36% from the floor.
Leopards' new signing Greg Hernandez made a good impression on his debut at this level with 22 points and 13 rebounds.
It was Leopards who started quicker, jumping out to a 12-6 lead behind 7 points from Hernandez, but Mohawks were down by just two after the opening quarter. Again Leopards forged ahead, leading by eight points early in the second only for Tees Valley to hit back with 13 consecutive points as Leopards' turnovers began to rack up.
Mohawks went into the locker rooms up six, but went scoreless for two and a half minutes at the start of the third to allow Leopards to tie the game and it was nip and tuck from thereon in.
Youngblood was frustrated by the final seconds, but felt his team had only themsleves to blame: "I looked over at their bench and they all clearly thought it was a three, but we didn't lose it because of that, we lost it because of our turnovers.
"I told the players that if we won it on the boards and had less turnovers, we get the win. We our-rebounded them by six, but had 21 turnovers to their 12, and they scored 27 points off them. We've simply got to take better care of the ball.
Butler was pleased with his team's effort: "It was a great win and close throughout the game - a fantastic advert for basketball. Our aim was to stop Taner Adu as we know he is a real threat offensively and as a team we reduced him to only 12 points which is a great effort."
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overtime |
The first ever game on the new court at Leeds Met University proved to be a thriller as visitors Bristol Flyers came back from a large deficit to force overtime and eventually win 67-61.
Hosts Leeds Carnegie started the game well and led 36-21 at half time, led by new signing Rob Marsden, but Bristol hit back to limit Leeds to just eight points in quarter three to narrow the gap to single digits.
Bristol hit the front for the first time inside the last 6 minutes of the contest, but neither team could take advantage of their final possessions and the game went to the extra period tied at 61.
Flyers maintained the momentum in the extra period as they prevented Leeds from registering any points and scored six of their own to start their season with a win.
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Division 1 newcomers Hemel Storm began in impressive fashion with a 90-62 road win at Brixton Topcats in the pool stages of the Trophy on Sunday.
Storm won each of the quarters, especially impressing in the first and fourth to comfortably come out ahead.
Dru Spinks was the game's top scorer with 22, but coach Dave Titmuss was most impressed with his four new players: "We used a 12 man rotation so that Mark Lloyd (assistant coach) and I could really assess everyone on the team. We thought our four new guys - Tom Adorian, Williamz Omope, Louis Sayers and Jacob Barr - looked really at home in our system.
"Hopefully we'll all be in better shape as the season progresses and we'll rise to the challenge that Division 1 will definitely present us.
Please note that the Leicester Warriors v Worthing Thunder game was abandoned in the second quarter due to a broken ring that was unable to be replaced.