Westminster Warriors Basketball Club

WARRIORS100 - SOLENT KESTRALS 60

Warriors U18's made their biggest statement of the season thus far with a runaway win against title contenders, Solent Kestrals.

The game brought together the 2 top teams in the Southern Premier National League and was on in which the Warriors looked ready for the challenge. "So far, Solent, Reading and ourselves look to be the form teams in the South - so it was definitely a game in which we wanted to come out and make a good representation of ourselves as we'll be seeing Solent again down the road" Warriors Coach Jackson Gibbons said.

The game got underway with the Warriors clearly looking to pound the ball inside to their powerhouse Eliandro Inacio, however 2 quick fouls sent him to the bench, raising early concerns for the Warriors as they were without Inacio's usual replacement, 6'5" Lucky Olaniyi, who was unavailable for the game. Forced to go 'small' the 'green machine' made up for their lack of height with blistering speed behind a newly re-energised pairing of Leon Bennet-Harris and Uiyosa Abifade who caused havoc on both ends of the floor. Bennet-Harris, in particular seemed keen to remind everyone what made him the leading scorer in the country last season, swishing in a barrage of 3-pointers from all over the court in leading his team in up at the quarter 23-12.

During the second quarter Warriors captain, Ryan Martin, continued the onslaught with an effective inside/outside attack which was beginning to look like too much for the surprised Kestrals to handle. Just when it looked like Martin and Bennet-Harris would be the players Solent most had to focus on, swingman Mostapha Alfaki decided to weigh in with some sweet shooting of his own, hitting a string of jump shots and baseline drives. Despite the overall offensive output from a focused Warriors unit, Solent were still within 10 points and threatened to get back into the game until defensive standout Arnold Tek-Kwo entered the game. As we've seen before, Tek-Kwo dominated the quarter with his defensive harrassment of the Solent guards, causing them to turn the ball over time after time - extending the Warrior lead to 19 at the half.

The secong half brought no relief for Solent, with Martin, Bennet-Harris and Abifade all increasing the onslaught on both ends of the floor. Midway through the 4th quarter it was clear the Warriors had won this battle and gave some much appreciated playing time to some of the younger U16's on the bench.

After the game, Warriors coach Nhamo Shire summed it all up: "We really got on the guys hard in practise this week as we have been getting complacent lately and challenged them to come out and show what we know they are capable of doing on the defensive end. I thought Leon and Yosa in particular showed a fine return to form and gave us great effort. Arnold was Arnold, it's hard to describe what he does out there. Sometimes he's a 1-man defensive wrecking machine and can disrupt a team all on his own. He was pretty amazing out there in the key stretch of the game. Ryan played with flu and still managed to rack up 24 points and 11 boards, which says alot about his heart and character. We've still got a long way to go in terms of improvement, but this was a step in the right direction".

Key Statistics:

Scoring: Bennet-Harris 34, Martin 24, Alfaki 15

Rebounding: Martin 11, Alfaki 7, Bennet-Harris/Inacio 6

Assists: Okereafor 4, Abifade 4, Martin/Bennet-Harris 3