The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

ONE or two times wasn't enough for the Commonwealth Bank Giants.

After three-peating as the New Providence Basketball Association (NPBA) champions, they went to Bimini and duplicated the feat in the Bahamas Basketball Federation's BTC Buddy Levarity National Championship series.

Over the weekend, despite a limited amount of teams entered, coach Perry Thompson said they had a rough time at the Gateway Academy Auditorium before they prevailed with a 103-83 victory over the Bimini Sands Braves.

The Braves actually opened a 26-14 lead and held onto a 48-45 margin at the half. But it was all Giants in the second half as they mounted their comeback to take the title again.

"It was great for us to retain the title for the nationals and complete the full three-peat cycle," said Giants' coach Perry Thompson after they won both the NPBA pennant and title to add to the national crown each year.

"Hats off to our sponsors, Commonwealth Bank, more than anything else. They made it as comfortable as possible for us while we were over there. In addition to that, our players really stepped their game up."

One of those players was Jackson Jacob, who exploded for a game high 30 points and was named the most valuable player. Ricardo Pierre had 26 points and Michael 'Fernly' Bain finished with 17.

For the Braves, Jamal Rolle had 22 points and Kipland Rolle helped out with 14 and Jonathan Edgecombe had 12.

"It was not easy regardless of the final score," Thompson said. "We were down by about 15-20 points in the first quarter and we ended up winning by 20 points.

"We realized that we had to step it up defensively and we went with a 1-2-2 press to try to wear them down because they were playing us more physical than anything else and that paid off for us because they couldn't handle the trap."

Once they managed to trim the deficit down to three at the half, Thompson said Pierre went on a shooting spree behind the arch in the second half and Jacob played one of his best games for the season.

Commonwealth Bank also got their post players in Gamalial Rose and Mark Hanna to take care of their business on the inside and Thompson said they started clicking on all cylinders in the second half. "I was really satisfied with the team's outing," he said. "We will take about a week or two off, then we will get together with the sponsor and organise some type of celebration."

As for next year, Thompson said since the NPBA playoffs, they had discussed the possibility of coming back to continue their winning streak.

"We just wanted to wait until our victory comes to fruition. But we're looking forward to next year," he said. "We expect to make one or two changes by getting younger with some new blood to see if we can come back and be competitive again."

The Giants joined the Four J's Lady Cheetahs, who played in three games against the Johnson's Lady Truckers as they came through in a 56-49 victory as Linda Pierre had a game high 20 points to earn the MVP honours.

Christine Sinclair contributed 11 in the win.

Latoya Rolle had a side high 18 and Melinda Bastian chipped in with 13 in the loss.

The federation had expected the championship teams from both Grand Bahama and Eleuthera to join the duo from New Providence. But neither showed up, leaving the two to battle it out in a three-game series.

The Lady Cheetahs came back after losing the opener to the Lady Truckers to secure the final two games to secure the title.

"They won the first game very easily because Anastacia (Moultrie) was not there. We didn't take our full team down there," Bowleg said. "But Annie was there for game two and we won that easily as well as game three with her in the line-up. It showed that we were still the better team."

Bowleg, however, said he was quite disappointed in the "no show" by the other two teams. "As an executive of the federation and as a coach, I'm disappointed," said Bowleg, the first vice president of the federation.

"They say they had some financial problems that caused them not to come. I guess the most expensive part was to come to Nassau and then catch another flight to Bimini. But you don't want to come to the nationals and play your third place team in your association."

Also on Saturday, the Grand Bahama Shipyard Cruisers held off the Eleuthera's Police Enforcers 56-49 as they clinched the consolation third place honours in the men's division.