Recap

The Eagles Academy under 16s picked up their first win of the season Saturday on the road at Premier North newcomers Bradford Dragons thanks to a barrage of three pointers. The first quarter began with the Eagles looking lively on offense with 5 points in the first 30 seconds, however the Eagles defensive discipline was lacking as they allowed a pair of early threes to Bradford danger man Osobor. The Eagles continued to play mediocre basketball in the first until the introduction of Jones who brought a sudden life to the Eagles offense by dropping in 12 points in just three minutes leading to a 20 – 26 score line in favour of the visiting Eagles.

In the second quarter the Eagles once again fired away from the outside a trifecta of threes by captain Jerrard and a pair of long-range bombs for Jones led to 15 of the Eagles 28 points in the quarter, often leading the bench to jump to their feet as it appeared Jones couldn’t miss in the first half. Though the big star of the quarter was the Eagles pressure defence led by Xie and Lewis as they tightened the screw forcing several turnovers from the Dragons. The Eagles were led in scoring by 20 points from senior guard Jones, whilst senior captain Jerrard poured in 15 of his own.

The third quarter with the Eagles looking sluggish out of the break as the Dragons continued to feed Osobor who’s size continued to trouble the Eagles throughout, however Sloan – on his birthday – often did the best job of slowing the big man and in the third the frustration of Osobor boiled over leading to a technical foul against him as he tried to begin an altercation with Sloan though the junior captain wasn’t riled by the process. The Eagles though were poor offensively scoring only 8 points in the quarter and conceding 16 to the Dragons.

The final quarter saw the Eagles score plenty of times off of turnovers scoring 34 in the quarter with the majority of those points coming off pressure defence from Jones, Xie and Lewis. Jones pouring in 18 points to help the Eagles pull away and this time it was young big man Leperrier joining Jones in the scoring with 12 in the quarter. Jones was the undoubted MVP for the Eagles with 40 points dueling with Osobor from Bradford throughout as Osobor dominated on his way to 48 points.

Top Scorers Eagles: 1. Jones (40) 2. Leperrier (19) 3. Jerrard (18)