GB Women Defeat Latvia, Take 3rd Place

Image: Dan Wooller/wooller.com

Natalie Stafford led the way as the GB women wrapped up the British Basketball Invitational Tournament with a third place finish, taking a 67-64 victory against Latvia on Saturday at Surrey Sports Park, Guildford.

Head Coach Tom Maher gave ten of his squad double digit minutes as GB chalked up their first victory of their EuroBasket warm-ups behind 18 points from Stafford.

After taking a commanding 40-21 lead at half time, it appeared as though GB were firmly in a control but a dominant third period from Latvia saw them right back in it. It was too little too late though as the Latvian side couldn’t quite get over the hump.

Azania Stewart was impressive for GB finishing with an efficient 10 points and 8 rebounds, whilst Julie Page added 10.

Gunta Basko led Latvia with 15 points and seven boards, with Elina Babkina adding 13 points and both Zana Tamane and Llena Jansone earned ten apiece.

GB guard, Stef Collins said:

“Today was a great win, we’re pretty excited to have achieved that at our home tournament. Our first two games were tough especially as it’s the first couple of games we’ve played together so we’re just getting a feel for each other. Germany were a very tough squad for our first game, but now that we’ve played Cuba we know that we can play at that level.

“Overall this tournament has been really great preparation for us ahead of EuroBasket and the crowd were amazing so we couldn’t have asked for anything better.”

Maher added:

“The British Basketball Invitational Tournament has been great and we’ve had the chance to play against some very good teams. Moving forward, we’ve got to work much more efficiently and work hard together to create that magic, I know we can be a great team.”

Natalie Stafford was named the GB player of the tournament.

Cuba took first place, going undefeated over the three days (3-0), Germany finished second (2-1), GB took third (1-2) whilst Latvia finished fourth, failing to register a win (0-3).