The battle for Division 2 survival has begun. A 67-55 loss to the University of Birmingham on Saturday, in a game that over three quarters the Kent Crusaders had a chance to win, means that the Crusaders will almost certainly be dragged into a relegation dogfight for the rest of the season.

This game summed up Crusaders season. At times they looked like they would beat the fourth place Uni of Birmingham side easily, and at other times they had big problems both defending and scoring.

The game was close early, despite Birmingham hitting three three-pointers, but Birmingham went on a 26-7 six minute run from the end of the first quarter to the start of the second, on the back of another four three pointers. At the score 37-16 Birmingham seemed to lose their shooting touch a little, while the Crusaders upped their defence. At the same time the home team found their scoring touch and finished out the half with a 13-4 run, which sent the two teams to the break with Birmingham up 12, 41-29.

After the break Birmingham again got the lead up to 20, points down in a key game at home didn’t seem to faze the Kent players. It was now the Crusaders displayed their defensive strength. The game turned physical and the Crusaders prospered, grinding out stop after stop to stifle Birmingham’s offense. Birmingham’s shooters no longer found the space they had enjoyed in the first quarter, and the Crusaders’ inside defence was patroled by big man Dan Garrad who was able to effectively stop the inside scoring, and the Birming offence stalled as a result.

For the next 11 minutes Crusaders held Birmingham to only two points, and behind scoring from Sam Betts, James Harris and Mike Webber the home side got it down to a four point game three minutes into the fourth quarter.

For the next three minutes none of the teams could find the bottom of the net, and Crusaders head coach Mads Olesen described this as the deciding point in the match: ”It was one of those times where the next team to score has the mental advantage. Birmingham’s Salisbury finally got the basket after we’d held them scoreless for more than six minutes of the final quarter, and it gave them the belief that they could win the game, while we got our heads down a little.”

For the rest of the game both teams tried to grind out basket against good defence, as Birmingham went up eight, 60-52, on a couple of free throws, before Kent cut it back down to five in the final two minutes. The Crusaders now fouled to stop time, and Birmingham hit five of six foul shots to grind out a win by 12 points, 67-55.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 24th, 2008 at 11:50 pm 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.