Men's Preliminary Final Review

The Central Australian Basketball League finals dream is over for South Adelaide’s men, who bowed out in in the preliminary final in overtime on Saturday night, though not without first exceeding all pre-season expectations.

Tom McKenzie scored 9 of South’s first 13 points via 3 three pointers, helping his team to take a 7 point lead into the quarter time break.

When centre Steve Pilkington’ s court time was limited by foul trouble, Norwood exploited South’s lack of height by pounding the ball inside to David Cooper and Dan Thompson for the next two quarters, but South still managed to hold a 10 point lead going into the third quarter.

The wheels then fell off for South, who only managed to score 7 points over the next 11 minutes and 57 seconds, but after consultation between the referees and the score bench, a Luke Frost put-back on the buzzer at the end of regulation sent the game into overtime.

The overtime was all Norwood, with Woollacott runner-up Todd Matthews playing a part in each of three consecutive baskets to start the period. Only missed foul shots allowed the final margin to be respectable, the Flames running away with an 88-81 victory.

Norwood would be relieved more than ecstatic to be returning to the Grand Final in Rupert Sapwell’s fourth year as head coach. While their first three quarters were below part, their final quarter and overtime performance demonstrated the quality that has become expected of them over the last two seasons.

Not enough can be said about the support provided by the vocal Panther Army and for the third weekend in succession, South played in front of a full house. A combination of club stalwarts and newer fans flocked in droves to Mars and, with some late assistance from the increasingly vocal Flames supporters, help create arguably the loudest audience in Central ABL history.




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