Recap

The Eagles U16 academy girls travelled to Leicester on Saturday 18th February. Their previous encounter ended in defeat for the Eagles so they knew they had to be at their best to get anywhere close to victory. However, what they hadn’t predicted was the intensity of the environment they would need to play in which, at times, became extremely frustrating and seemed almost chaotic.
The Eagles got off to a great start under the guidance of Coach Martin Walton, with team coach, Marina Fernandez, being unavailable due to her own WBBL away game. The girls worked hard at both ends of the court and although they struggled a little with boxing out against the bigger bodies of the Leicester Rider girls, they managed to keep the score close and ended the first quarter down 19-16. Lexie Walton got the scoring for the visitors underway and Ellison Burke added to the points with some strong drives to the basket backed up at the other end of the court with some great defence by Cleo Wealleans-Watts who pressured the opposition and managed to get some steals.
As the second quarter got underway, Grace Rae continued to perform strongly and after rebounding well on defence, she skilfully executed an end-to-end drive and put the first points of the quarter on the board. The girls continued to fight hard, determined not to let the home team dominate the scoreline in the way they had at their previous encounter.
As the second half started, things seriously unravelled for the Eagles girls. On inbounding the ball, the girls were repeatedly trapped in the corner of the court, unable to get the ball across the line due to the aggression of the opposition and as a result of this high number of turnovers, the Riders ran away with the scoreline. Frustrations ran high, as did the foul count, and with a technical for the Rider’s coach, the atmosphere in the arena was intense. The quarter ended with a disappointing 38-7 score which did not reflect the hard work and effort that the visitors were putting in.
In the final quarter, Seraphine O’Neill put on an impressive display of 3-point shooting, knocking down four bringing her total number of threes for the game to six. This along, with points from Katherine Bird and Sophie Hawkins in the fourth, ensured the gap didn’t widen too much further whilst at the other end, a determined attitude from the Eagles girls stopped their opponents from reaching 100 despite their efforts to do so.
With a final score of 97-52, Coach Martin Walton ensured the girls knew that their efforts had been noted whilst recognising the challenges they had faced. Their next game is at home to Bristol Flyers.