The Body and Mind Kent Crusaders recorded tough loss and a vital win in their two away games this weekend. A 5 point win over Black Country University Wolverhampton, one of our closest rivals, lifted the club out of the immediate relegation zone, and left Black Country second to last. The win over Black Country came after a 12 point loss to a very good Northampton Neptunes side in a close fought Saturday game.

Head coach Mads Olesen was relieved to get the win: “The game against Black Country was a must win for us, and even if it wasn’t pretty the guys came together at the end and got the win. The win leaves three teams behind us at the bottom of the league, and getting an away win at oune of our rivals is vital”.

Crusaders travelled to Wolverhampton Sunday knowing that a loss would have sent them into a relegation place, with Wolverhampton passing them in the table. Wolverhampton had recorded a victory over fellow relegation battlers NEWI Nets on Saturday and another win would have sent them above Crusaders.

Both the teams struggled to find their rhythm early in the game but Crusaders established a slender lead early on. However Wolverhampton’s 3-point shooters caught fire hitting three straight shots helping the home side edge the first quarter 21-18. Crusaders tightened up on defence in the second quarter holding the home side to ten points, while balances scoring saw Crusaders put up 16. The game went into half time finely balanced with Crusaders holding a 3 point lead, 34-31.

”I thought both teams looked nervous in the first half,” said Olesen of the first half, ”and I know my side played far below what they are capable of, especially on defence. We stressed the importance of defence at half time, but it didn’t seem to stick.”

It was the home side that responded coming out of the break quickly cancelling out Kent’s lead. Midway through the 3rd quarter the two sides still couldn’t be separated with only 1 point between them, Wolverhampton up 41-40. The game didn’t stay this close for long and with Wolverhampton starting to dominate the offensive boards; they went on an 11-3 run to end the quarter leading by 9 points.

Crusaders had it all to do with only ten minutes to go. They were ten minutes that could go a long way to deciding the club’s future in division 2. So many times this year games have slipped away from Crusaders but the Kent players were going to take this game whatever it took. The final quarter saw every Crusader player on the court step up and make plays to inspire a 20-4 run.

”Defensively we played the best ten minutes of the season”, said Olesen, “The players on the court made one tough play after another, and didn’t get rattled no matter what Wolverhampton threw at them.”

Crusader James Harris hit the side’s only 3-pointer with four minutes to go to bring the Crusaders up by two, setting up the Crusaders win. Wolverhampton began fouling in the final two minutes of the game but Rikki Broadmore stayed cool under pressure hitting four of six foul shots, on his way to a team high 16 points, to close out the win for Kent; with the final score 63-58.

James Harris commented on the game “The team pulled together today when we needed it. Everyone played their part and I thought young guys like Rikki top scoring and JP Dimanji with his rebounds and blocks were huge!”

The Crusaders also put in a promising performance in the Saturday game of the double header, a tough trip to Northampton. The Neptune’s came into the game confident having beaten previously undefeated Tees Valley Mohawks the previous week. But Crusaders as always showed their ability to compete with quality opposition trading baskets with the Midlands club for the first 4 minutes of the game. Neptune’s hit their big men inside for some scores towards the end of the first quarter to open up a 6 point lead going into the second period. The second quarter saw a number of small runs from both sides and key scores from Mike Webber (13 points for the game) and Steve Findley (19 points) kept Crusaders close, going into half time 40-36 down.

Crusaders put the home team under even more pressure in the 3rd quarter drawing level after 2 minutes and then taking the lead 8 minutes into the quarter 49-50. From this point on however Northampton took control scoring ten quick points to retake the lead and end the 3rd quarter 7 points up. In the last quarter Crusaders made a number of attempts to get back into the game but couldn’t close the 10 point gap. With three minutes left Kent began fouling but Neptunes converted their free throws to end the game winners 91-75 in a score line not reflective of the closeness of the contest.

Head Coach Olesen thought Crusaders could take a lot of positives from this game into Sunday: “Saturday we probably played the most disciplined game of the season. We stuck to the game plan and executed the entire game, we just met a team that was better. They have picked up five players when Division 1 side West Harts folded, and they have shown they are now a force to be reckoned with, beating previously undefeated Tees Valley last week. After getting beat by 30 by Northampton in the Patrons cup, I think that the players can be proud of their performance against a vastly improved team, even if we ended up losing.”

Top scorer Steve Findley also took positives from the game “Execution of the game strategy was good for three quarters. We now need to display an attacking instinct to close out these types of games against quality opposition.”

Captain Pete Ayling added “It was a spirited performance against the odds. In the end we came up a little bit short, but the final score didn’t reflect the game.”

This entry was posted on Monday, January 14th, 2008 at 12:22 am and is filed under Game Reports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.