Tues 12th Dec, Hythe, Southampton
The Seahawks drew the Hythe Waterside Bucks in the Solent Area Cup. We had faced them as our opening game in the League this 2017-18 season, and quickly showed our dominance, jumping to a 27-11 lead at half time... but then imploded to a loss, under lack of experience. Last week we had faced the A-team, the Stags, and taken them to overtime in a great performance, and so entering the match, confidence was high. But again we had to travel to Hythe, a solid, slippery court, with poor shooting rims.
The first quarter was hideously slow. They had clearly studied our offence from the previous week and were playing a high 3/2 zone to stop the high post entry. But ball movement was good and we were getting good looks and open shots from the wing and corners. It just wouldnt drop! Defensively, we played a solid man-to-man and cut off everything that came at us. It ended 5-4 after 10 mins.
The second was much of the same. Peter and Henry were running the point positions well, moving the ball, and finding players. Josh was capitalising on the wings, finding space, and adding to his tally, whilst I also got good looks and could not, get the ball to drop. Some dodgy refereeing, missing calls at both ends, and calling fouls inconsistenly kept both teams on their toes, but with Myles, Gozim and Yera working well underneath grabbing rebounds, we punished them with 2nd and 3rd attempts. It was Peters' speed they couldn't match as he diced the defence, and then when they backed off, nailed his shots. With 9 to his name in the quarter, we edged out into a lead, 22-16 at the break.
The 3rd quarter is where we turned the screw and put the game to bed. I finally hit a shot, before Josh added more. Henry added a triple, 1 from the line and 1 from the field, as he started to show his confidence in his game. Abner was playing great harassing defence on their main shooter, and shutting him down, as we held them to just 4 points in the quarter. Where we got frustrated was with the officiating. Crazy calls, and odd fouls, meant Myles picked up the weirdest 4 fouls Ive seen, and Yera was also in foul trouble, as they warmed the bench. Peter was getting hammered on drives, but got nothing to show for it; I got hit on the shot, which I then hit, but it was classed as end line ball?? But as our lead stretched we had to remain calm and let the Bucks boil over.
At the start of the 4th, we knew we were 10 mins away from the win, but we still needed to finish. We were aiming for 50point game, and maybe even doubling them. When Myles fouled out, when he was nowhere near the shooter, we were a little dumbfounded, but it was the Bucks who led their heads go, with 2 Technical calls back to back, and ejections from the game. Our offence slowed down and controlled the game, with superb ball movement from the guards. Yera found the basket with a put back, again dominating with Gozim on the boards, and added another from the line to cap it. Defensively we did exactly what we needed, sending them to the line, where they failed to capitalise, but with a final (random) 3 ball, the managed to win the quarter, but it was no-where near enough, as we closed out the game with sensible quality.
It ended 46-31 to the Seahawks in our first win of the season. Finally, having come so close, we are over the line and on our way.
[Scorers: Huang 19, Wood 9, Strongman 8, Aimeganbetov 5, Lau 3,]