St Augustine blow out Barataria 105-13

THE EAST Zone of the NGC/Express School’s Basketball League rolled back into the Eastern Regional Sport Facility, Golden Grove Road, Tacarigua with a double-header in the Under-17 and Under-20 divisions yesterday. In the first match of the afternoon Trinity College East beat Valencia High School 51-45 after battling neck and neck over the full 40 minutes. Valencia started impressively to lead 8-2 at the end of the first quarter. Tellist Belfon and Jeffrey Harris were the main force in attack and combined for 24 points of their team’s tally, scoring 12 points each, and were responsible for Valencia staying in the match.

At the half-time interval however, Trinity were in control of the match with a four point, 20-16, lead, one that Valencia came close to but could not overtake. The closest their efforts could bring them was to a 42-42 tie-up with three minutes to go in the fixture’s fourth quarter. At this point Trinity’s Rafael Joseph and Andre Nurse took over the proceedings and helped their team to the final tally with some fierce offensive play. Joseph ended the match on a match-high 26 points while Nurse had 18 points to his name and Curtis Maloney was the third Valencia scorer with nine points. In stark contrast to the earlier fixture, the St Augustine Senior Comprehensive/Barataria Senior Comprehensive fixture was a total blowout as St Augustine recorded a demoralising 105-13 win to send a warning to their opponents.

Semi-finalists last season, St Augustine were beaten by eventual Under-20 division runners-up UWI Sixth Form assisted by a new technical staff. In their camp are Anthony Tannis, a guard for North Zone’s Defence Force and Raymond Watkins, a former star for the Nettoville Pistons of Arima during the 1980s. St Augustine led 37-5 at the end of the first quarter and 55-9 at the half .  Luane Look Tow scored a match-high 22 points; Jesse O’Neil had 20, Jerwin Agard hit 16 and Duane Ottley topped it off with 15. Barataria Senior Comprehensive had Sheldon Hernandez on the board with six points but would need more scorers and a whole new defensive strategy to survive the season.