BBL Weekly Round Up

London Lions missed the chance to secure a play-off spot in the BBL Championship Wednesday night as they were beaten 89-63 by champions Leicester Riders.

A capacity crowd at Crystal Palace couldn’t roar the Lions to a victory that would have set up a quarter-final clash with the same opponents.

Instead the Riders dominated throughout, Jay Cousinard top-scoring with 21 points to help his team cruise to a 29th victory of the regular season.

Leicester poured in 30 points in the first quarter to storm ahead, though London did threaten to make a game of it with a 10-3 run at the start of the second that was rounded off by a dunk from Orlan Jackson.

However, the Riders pulled 52-38 clear by half time before killing the game off a constest with a 14-4 start to the third quarter.

Captain Drew Sullivan finished with a double-double of 13 points and 10 rebounds for Leicester, who have still lost just twice in the league campaign.

Lions qualify for play-offs

A valiant final quarter fightback was not enough for Manchester Giants to qualify for the end-of-season play-offs as London Lions‘ 87-85 victory was enough to claim the final spot.

The Giants were 14 points adrift at the end of the third period and although they clawed away the deficit, they fell just short.

Tayo Ogedengbe topped the scoring with 25 points as the Lions squeezed in, in eighth place.

Leicester Riders suffered their third defeat of the season Friday night when they were beaten 86-58 at Worcester Wolves.

Newcastle Eagles came from behind to beat Glasgow Rocks 93-80 with a high-scoring final quarter, American Damon Huffman scoring an eye-catching 36 points.

There is still no light amid the gloom of Mersey Tigers‘ season as they went down to their 32nd defeat from 32 games, this time a 100-87 defeat by Durham Wildcats.

Worcester Wolves enjoyed a 106-69 victory over Plymouth Raiders on Saturday night.

Both teams were already guaranteed a top-six finish and safely in the play-offs but it was Worcester who dominated from the outset, winning all four quarters.

Alex Owumi was the Wolves’ top scorer with 19 points, while Javarris Barnett poured in a game-high 24 points for the Raiders.

The fixture schedule for the quarter-finals of the BBL Championship play-offs was finalised after wins for Surrey Heat and Glasgow Rocks on Sunday.

The Heat earned a 101-99 overtime victory against Plymouth Raiders and the Rocks crushed bottom side Mersey Tigers 90-57 on the final day of the regular season.

Both teams finish level on 42 points, but it is the Glasgow side who claim third place and a play-off with Plymouth by dint of a better head-to-head record.