BUCS Basketball Final 8’s Day 2 Recap

Image Credit: Nathan Dainty

Day 2 of the BUCS Basketball Final 8’s took place in Sheffield yesterday, with the two semi-finals needing an extra period to be decided. Brief game reports followed by some notes (to be updated):
Game 1
Middlesex vs Brunel
Brunel took on Middlesex in the first game of the day, and as expected cruised to an  81-48 victory-a margin that could have been a lot larger had Brunel not ran their bench for large portions of the second half. Tom Politi led Brunel with 24 points, whilst Matt Carpenter added 20. J Visokas had 15 to lead Middlesex, with O. Olaolorun adding 11 to join him as the only other player in double figures.

Game 2
Northumbria vs Leeds Met
Leeds Met, after suffering a tough defeat in the first round, bounced back for an 87-60 win over Northumbria. Henry Wilkins led Leeds Met with 15 points, Zoltan Supola added 14, Mike Medved 13 and M Koltun 12. Luke McClean was was the only player in double figures for Northumbria with 11, whilst Nils Steuber and Josh Merrington added 8 each respectively.

Game 3
LSBU vs Durham (Semi Final)
The most anticipated matchup of the day, saw last year’s runners up (LSBU) take on a team that many believed would have had a shot at winning it last year had they not had matched up with the eventual winners (Leeds Met) in the first round. The game did not disappoint, with Durham securing a 75-69 overtime victory. Paul Nelson led Durham with 29 points, whilst Kevin Bulger had 25 including the gametying basket with 8 seconds left to send it to OT. Mike Martin led LSBU with 20, whilst Armand Anebo had 14 and Karolis Petkus had 11.

Game 4
Worcester vs Oxford (Semi Final)
The other semi final of the day also didn’t disappoint, with another overtime period which saw Worcester get past Oxford 101-95. Aleksas Zimnickas led Worcester with 29, 21 of which came in the first half, Callum Jones had 21 with Luke Sanders adding 19. Oxford were left by Will Scott’s 34 points, Stephen Danley added 22, whilst Karolis Bauza had 18 and Reed Doucette 14.

Sunday 20th March Schedule
9am Middlesex vs Northumbria
11am Brunel vs Leeds Met (5th/6th place playoff)
1pm LSBU vs Oxford (3rd/4th place playoff)
3pm UWIC vs Leeds Met (Women’s Final
5pm Durham vs Worcester (Men’s Final)

Notes

• Highlight of the day goes to Durham’s Chris Pearce for his game sealing steal and dunk on LSBU in OT to ensure the victory. Video coming soon.
• My prediction of an LSBU-Oxford final gets thrown out of the window. It must be said though, that both LSBU and Oxford looked to be in control of pretty much the entire game until having breakdowns in the last few minutes of regulation and then not getting it done in OT.
• Durham’s big man Paul Nelson (a former Yale player) has been dominant inside over the past two days, had about 5 or 6 dunks today.
• For updates throughout today, follow us on Twitter @Hoopsfix, and ‘like’ our Facebook page.