HOOPS REVIEW - Game 1: Reapers vs Splash Brothers

Hey everyone!

I’m hoping you all enjoyed your week and are looking forward to a great weekend!

Firstly, I’d like to wish you all a happy and safe Remembrance Day, and thank you to all of those who have served and continue to serve for your respective countries.

Now, lets get stuck in!

I wish I had better news for all of you this week, but unfortunately, we lost our first game of the season when we faced the Splash Brothers. The game ended with a final score of 50-65, with our highest scorer being Jorel Smith with 20 points, followed by Zavante Garnett and Jadon Springer contributing 12 and 10 respectively. As a team we were out-rebounded by 26 to 21, which doesn’t look terrible on paper, but the boards we gave up proved to be key offensive rebounds which were then converted.

What didn’t go so well…

Well, we lost so… what else?

No but seriously, it wasn’t a terrible game. There were good spells where we had really strong defensive pressure followed by quick, precise offense which either resulted in going to the free throw line or scoring from open play. What we failed to do however was assert ourselves on the glass, which with our collective size, length and athleticism, we should have done much better at. We also could have chosen our shots a little more carefully, and taken our time on offense by working the ball around more to find better looks. There were numerous times down the court where we rushed either in isolation situations or dribble drive scenarios, where if we had swung the ball we could have had a better opportunity.

What went pretty well…

Even though we lost by 15 points in the end, we actually had a 10 point lead going into the second quarter, which was cut to a 2 point lead going into the half. I’ll put this down to a lack of familiarity with each other, and we only had two substitutes on the bench, so by the beginning of the third quarter we were pretty gassed. I thought we communicated pretty well on offense and defense, again however, a lot of this died down during the third quarter when everyones legs were just gone.

What to look forward to next game…

We were able to pick up Colby Mapp from the waiver wire, who is a long athletic player and will definitely help out on the glass and defensively. We should also have both Napthali Smith and Jericho Tucker back for our next game against the current league leaders, Young Goatz. Both will add height and shooting where we desperately needed some more threatening perimeter players last time out. I’m looking forward to seeing what we can do when we’ve got everyone available, which hopefully will be controlling both the offensive and defensive rebounds.

Also, I’m really hoping to be able to livestream the games going forward. I wasn’t able to get a good vantage point given the bleachers at Berkeley are quite shallow and don’t offer much height at the back like at Cedarbridge, unless of course you all don’t mind watching the fans? I’m sure I’ll figure something out, maybe a special bench camera? Maybe, probably too much swearing would be heard for social media lol, if thats even possible!

I’ll be trying to get two posts out next week, so until then, check you later!

Enjoy your weekends!

Jason