The Newcastle Eagles go into tonight’s crucial Super Leage Basketball Championship game against Cardiff Met Archers at the Vertu Motors Arena boosted by an excellent road victory at Essex Rebels by 72 – 67. A win that star USA guard Jada Guinn admitted was important to register.

“It was a key win coming off the Oaklands loss. You want to change the mentality next game up. Regroup, refocus. We knew winning that game would put us in a position to finish the highest the Eagles have ever done so we just refocused for the next game.”

Its fair to say as well that Guinn’s own personal performance in the win at Essex was quite spectacular. The combo guard scored almost 35% of her side’s points with 25 and just for good measure added in 15 rebounds, 6 assists and 5 steals. An unbelievable effort.

Without doubt her best game as a professional in her rookie season. Was it the best game of her life so far?

“I had a triple-double in High School that was up there but I was most proud defensively. I don’t think I’ve ever had that many steals in a game so that was a good thing and obviously 15 rebounds was huge. Especially being 5’ 8”!”

“That was really good. It was a good performance and I’m glad we got the win and I was able to help the team out.”

Guinn is having a phenomenal season. Third in the league in scoring at 21.9 pts a game. Fifth in assists at 5.4 a game. She’s made the second most field goals in The League has the best field goal percentage, has made the most 2-point baskets and leads The SLB in 2-point percentage as well.

“I’m doing pretty good so I’m really pleased. It goes back to all the hard work I’ve put in and I’ve prepared to be in this moment and happy that all that hard work is showing out.”

Turning to the Cardiff game it is a very winnable game for The Eagles who actually won down in Cardiff by 80 to 45 early in the season. But this is a different Met Archers time these days. They’ve won three out of their last four games and only lost to Oaklands Wolves by eight last time out.

“They were close to Oaklands last week and it just goes to showing that you can’t look at who you’re playing and play down to the competition. At this point every game is important so we need to prepare like we would for any other team that we’re going against.”

“We actually talked in practice watching film of Cardiff about the position we’re in right now. We’re trying to win out for the rest of the season and hopefully Sheffield will lose out a couple of games and that would put us into second. But we’re just trying to finish out the season as strong as we can.”

This will be The Eagles first home game for a month after three successive long road trips. Guinn is aware of the importance of playing in front of her and her teammates own fans.

“We’ve been on the road forever and feels like we went to London almost three weeks in a row. But any home game is always fun. The fans come out and make it a great experience. So, we’re very happy to be back at home.”

As always on a Saturday night in the Arena for a SLB Women’s Championship game the tip-off will be at 7:30pm as Newcastle and Guinn look to continue their excellent form this season.