Newcastle Eagles 96 (31, 51, 74) (Moore 19, Chapman 18, Bridge 14 )

Essex Pirates 65 (18, 42, 53) (Toluwase 13, Mumuni 12, Adu 10)

Newcastle Eagles claimed their second big home win of the season against basement dwellers Essex Pirates as they kept their unbeaten home record at Sport Central intact.

After a much needed extended break to recover from a rocky few weeks, there was some great news for home fans with player-coach Fab Flournoy suited up to play and young exciting prospect Ross Wilson making a scoring debut having been drafted from the U18 Eagles side.

The visitors started sloppily with 4 turnovers inside the first couple of minutes and a score by Joe Chapman handed them their first double digit lead at 20-9 with four minutes to go in the opening period.

It was enough for Tim Lewis to call time-out and his team responded with six unanswered points when they returned to the floor although triples by Chapman and Andrew Bridge as well as a last gasp running jumper by Andre Lockhart helped the hosts restore their double figure lead at 31-18.

Essex were much improved in the second period and having looked like they might get blown out early, they rallied and stepped things up much to the frustration of the home side who were happy to get into the locker room after allowing the Pirates to close the gap to 51-42.

Things could have been worse had Pirates not missed eleven free-throws in the first half but it was to prove to be of little importance as after a half-time rollicking by Fab Flournoy, the home team came out fired-up in the third.

They shifted through the gears and a 10-0 start was a sign of things to come as they went on a 16-1 run to kill off any notion of a shock Pirates win. The win was made even sweeter for the home fans when Wilson took to the floor and grabbed his first ever points in the BBL.

Trey Moore led his team with 19 points, 7 rebounds and 7 assists.