Basketball: National leagues - Baya scrape past Hawks, Dawgz keep up the pressure |17 June 2014

The clash of the weekend took place on Sunday when undefeated league leaders Baya took on struggling defending champions PLS Hawks at Victoria Gymnasium.
Having already suffered two defeats prior to this encounter, PLS Hawks’ title defence was already suffering before they met league leaders Baya in a must-win game and they lost for the third time on an 83-84 score.

The match started evenly, with both sides desperate to get the win as the scores remained tied at the end of the first quarter – 16-16. Things carried on along the same line in the second quarter as the Hawks managed to take a one-point lead at the half-time break on a 37-36 score.

In the third quarter, Baya upped their game as they looked to take the lead in the match. They did just that as they outscored the Hawks 33-25 to take the overall score to 69-62. At this point, Baya looked on their way to grabbing a seventh consecutive win, but the Hawks were desperate to get back and regain the lead to get the win and put their title defence back on track. Despite putting up a good fight, the Hawks tried to close the gap but in the end lost out by a single point as they pushed the league leaders all the way. The final score was 84-83 in favour of Baya.
Centre Timmy Adam scored a game-high 31 points to lead his side to victory, while Rodney Lozé netted 19 points to lead the Hawks.
The win takes Baya to a maximum 14 points from seven games.

Hawks meanwhile find themselves in real trouble as they have just 9 points following three wins and three losses.
Second placed Mont Fleuri Dawgz, who have been improving steadily over the years, kept the pressure on league leaders Baya as they claimed their fifth win in six games on Saturday when they triumphed over Drifters.

However, Drifters started the games fairly equal to their more experienced opponents as they kept the scores close but trailed by one point – 38-37 – at the end of the first half.
It was in the third quarter that the Dawgz stretched their lead further as they finished the period with an eight-point lead (54-46).

In the final quarter, the Dawgz kept their momentum to further increase their lead and close out the game on a 73-60 final score.
Captain Steven André scored 17 points to lead the Dawgz, who also got 16 points from Cyril Agrippine.

In the weekend’s other first division match, last season’s surprise package Beau Vallon Heat took on an MBU Rockers side who had only lost once prior to Saturday’ game.
The match was billed a close encounter but it failed to live up to that prediction.

The Heat started the brighter of the two sides as they finished the first quarter ahead on a 28-16 scoreline. They kept the same momentum in the second quarter as they increased their lead to 17 points (42-25).

Beau Vallon Heat were proving too strong for MBU Rockers who were far from their best on the day as they fell further behind after the third quarter, where the scores read 71-37.
The Rockers only found their stride in the final quarter, but by then their efforts were too late as the Heat had already sewn up the match.

Despite outscoring the Heat 20-17 in this quarter, the Rockers fell to an 88-57 loss to the boys of coach Guy Hall. Beau Vallon Heat’s Françoise led the game’s scores with 31 points, whereas Nigel Sinon contributed 21 points for the Rockers.

In the women’s league, Mont Fleuri defeated rivals Anse Etoile Stars 56-51 with Bernadette Songor scoring 19 points for the 2013 Seychelles Basketball Federation Cup champions.

S. N.