Sarah Round has been rewarded for her brilliant efforts for the Northants Basketball Club this season.
Round, who plays for the under-14 and 15 girls teams of the NBC, have been recognised by the sport’s governing body.
Round, who is a pupil at Northampton School for Girls, is one of just two English players to be invited to attend a camp in Postojna in Slovenia.
The camp, which will be held in July, is run by FIBA the European governing body with just two players from all the European nations being invited to attend, so this is a massive honour for Round and reward for her hard work and dedication.
This season she has helped both her club teams reach the end-of-season play-offs, as well as playing in the Northampton School for Girls under 17 team that has reached the National Schools Final.
THE inclement weather last Saturday caused the closure of the Northants Basketball Centre and the cancellation of the four scheduled games.
Next weekend has been declared deadline day for games to be played by England Basketball, but several under aged players are due to attend England training camps that weekend and coaches are reluctant to play without those players.
The games called off at the NBC were: VCARS Division Four play-off first round: Northants Thunder versus Stockport Spartans.
Several Stockport players were literally ‘snowed in’, so even before the closure of the Basketball Centre this game was in doubt.
Cadet Men’s Premier Division North: Northants Thunder versus Cheshire Panthers
Cadette Women’s Midland, South-West Conference: Northants Thunder versus Bromsgrove Bears
Under 14 Girls Midland South West Conference: Northants Lightning versus London Youngbloods.
The final two games have an important bearing on the final positions of Conference play and these in turn have a bearing on play-off opponents and home advantage.
Because of all the cancellations, these games will have to be re-arranged for full details please look on the club’s website which www.northantsbasketballclcub.net.
Northants Thunder 61
Leicester Warriors 73
Leicester arrived in Northampton knowing a win would guarantee them a Junior Men’s Premier Division North play-off spot, and almost certainly gain them third place in the league.
The Northants team were playing for their pride alone as they were certain of their mid-table finish.
Warriors started the game well, were 18-13 ahead by the end of the first quarter, and went on to seal the win and a play-off place.
In the team’s final game of the season, Matt Yates with 28 points was the only Thunder player to score in double figures and that unfortunately has very much been the story of the season for coach Rob Eddon’s team. A slow start, play catch-up and rely on Yates to score points.
Wiltshire Demons 40
Northants Lightning Too 106
Wiltshire Demons 38
Northants Lightning Too 105
Cancellations earlier in the season meant the Northants cadette women’s team were left with two games to play against Wiltshire Demons to wrap up their Cadette Women’s Midland, South-West Conference campaign.
The two clubs agreed that the two games would be played ‘back to back’ in Wiltshire last Saturday, so while the rest of the country froze the two teams met in the balmy climate of the west country.
Demons are a young inexperienced team who are languishing in the lower reaches of the Conference table so it was no surprise that despite two determined to performances from Demons, Lightning Too recorded two decisive wins that moves them up to second place in the table.
Both games last Saturday’s were very similar with Lightning Too able to run their transition offence to good effect with Demons unable to cope with the Northants ‘bigs’.
The team is now assured of a play-off place but will have to wait to see exactly where they will finish in the final table
Brentwood Fire 111
Northants Lightning 47
Northants under-13 girls suffered a heavy East of England Under 13 Girls League defeat at the hands of a rampant Brentwood Fire team.
But the loss represented a big improvement for the inexperienced team from the previous game.
Fire played an aggressive pressing defence even when the outcome of the game had been decided but Bahira Barakat handled the pressure well and Ellie Solomon managed to score 16 points.
Another Lightning player to shine was Precious Ogaji who recorded a double-double with 14 points and 18 rebounds.
Loreto Sixth Form College 93
Northampton School for Girls 121
NSG booked themselves a place in the final of the Under-17 Dynamix Championships after a convincing win over Loreto Sixth Form College from Manchester in a two-legged semi-final.
NSG won the first leg 57-55 at the Amaechi basketball Centre in Manchester and were confident going into the second leg last week.
Even they were surprised at the eventual ease of their 64-38 win to earn them an aggregate 121-93 win.
In the second leg, Lois Bain turned in an excellent defensive performance while Amy Boot and Sarah Round controlled the back court, leading to a number of easy scores for Steph Ogden.
In the final on April 6, NSG will face Greig City Academy from Haringey.
Moulton College 55
Gateway College 59
WHEN these two teams met previously in the British Colleges Men’s Midlands Men’s Elite League, Gateway were winners by more than 80 points.
This four-point defeat represented a massive improvement, although the Gateway coach did sit his front line players out of the game for substantial periods of time.
Even so Moulton’s performance showed just how far several individuals and the team as a whole have come.
Moulton opened the game in aggressive mood, rushing out to an 8-0 lead. Gateway rallied strongly and by the end of the first period of play had reduced the deficit to six points at 10-16.
Moulton opened the second quarter with two huge three-pointers from skipper Matt Yates to increase their lead to 22-10 which led to Gateway fielding their leading players .
Linas Bajoranus was still causing Gateway problems and at half-time Moulton had their noses in front at 28-25.
Gateway edged the third quarter 14-12, so Moulton went into the final 10 minutes holding Moulton narrow 40-39 lead.
Gateway took the lead for the first time early in the fourth quarter but Moulton went on an 8-2 run of their own to retake the lead at 48-46, and with less than three minutes of the game remaining still led 55-51.
But the closing minutes were a nightmare for Moulton, and Gateway sealed the win.
In the exciting four point loss, Moulton’s top scorers were Yates and Bajorunas with 20 and 18 points respectively with Byron Wing contributing eight points.
Bajorunas also pulled down an impressive 14 rebounds but he wasn’t very happy with his total of nine turn overs.