Northamptonshire Titans Undser-14s are celebrating after they eased into the second round of the EBL Play-offs with a 71-53 win over Bradford Dragons.
Saturday saw the first round of play-offs for league champions, and NEBC Titans were handed a home draw against an unknown quantity in the Dragons.
With a three-week break since their last competitive game, Titans seemed sluggish and tired in the first quarter although Trei St Vie Hutchinson soon put them on the score sheet.
Dragons seemed a depleted team with only two subs on the bench, however they seemed to relish in Titans’ tiredness and were soon on their heels.
The second quarter proved difficult for the Titans with some decisions from the referee not going in their favour their heads hung low, the bench was rotated well and a half time score of 31-23 was a fair reflection on the performance.
After half time the boys came out renewed and started strong, but Bradford still had all to play for and were not going to give up easily, with some great play from two of the Dragons team showed holes in Titans’ usually impenetrable defence.
The third quarter as usual was the Northants side’s strongest period with them putting 22 points on the board.
With a couple of three-pointers from Callum Charteris and Setemi Omoyeni the team seemed to rally round and start to fire on all cylinders.
In the final quarter even with four of the starting five on four fouls, the team edged to a bigger lead of 71-53 booking them a spot in the last eight teams in the country, one step closer to Final Fours.
That quarter-final is this Saturday, with Titans taking on Lewisham Thunder of the National League at Weavers in Wellimgborough (tip-off 12.30pm).
All spectators welcome.
EBL Under 16 Boys Play-off second round
York Eagles 70 Northamptonshire Titans 86
NEBC Titans made a 400-mile round trip to take on the North East Conference Champions York Eagles for a place in the Elite 8 in the U16 end of season play-offs.
Despite York playing in the Conference, the average points margins of their wins this season has been between the 60–80 point differences, which suggests that they could easily compete with the top teams in the Premier Division.
However, it was Titans who got off to a good start taking the first quarter 27-7 with some pressure defence leading to some fast break scores which stunned the home side.
As pleasing as it was to get a first period lead, it was The Eagles that came out in the second period with determination and having regrouped they started to convert their opportunities.
This was helped by the Titans squandering opportunity after opportunity and failing to execute their half-court plays in the second quarter and a combination of unforced errors and poor transition defence gave the Yorkshire side a glimmer of hope.
The Titans’ poor coverage and communication at the defensive end of the court allowed York to win the quarter 26-16 which trimmed the Titans lead to 10, going into the half-time break with 43-33 scoreline.
An even third quarter which saw York pull it back to within seven points gave the Eagles fans something to cheer about, and the sense of a comeback was apparent to all.
However, Titans responded with a 10-0 run and pushed the lead back to double digits.
Titans took the third period 24-16 and headed into the final stanza 67-49 ahead.
In the weekend that featured some giant-killing shocks, NEBC ensured their place to be one of the last eight teams standing by narrowly losing the fourth quarter 21-19.
However, the result at this point was never in doubt.
Although the winning margin could have and should have been larger, it was a satisfactory result after the longest road trip that Titans will make this season.
This, combined with the team’s improvement in reaching this stage for the first time, has given them confidence as they face last season champions Newham All-Star Academy for a place in the Final Fourss.
In the 16 point win 11 of the 12 players got onto the score-sheet. Top scorers were Sharif St John 17, Andre Arissol 16, Jordan Francis 15 and Timi Gril 13.
The next fixture is away to Newham All-Star Academy on Sunday, Tip off is 1.30pm.