HOOPS Review - Play-In Game: ABSG Reapers vs Splash Brothers

Hey everyone!

I hope you enjoyed your weekend, and happy Hump Day!

Damn, I wish I was writing this with better news, but unfortunately your ABSG Reapers have been eliminated from playoff contention after losing to the Splash Brothers 61-78. To be fair to us, we played to the final whistle, had some fun and shared some laughs, and ruffled some feathers in the process, we definitely didn’t go down without a fight! Napthali concluded his meteoric rise this season with 28 points and 7 rebounds, absolutely decimating the Splash Brothers’ defense. Jorel also finished up with 15 points and 7 assists, and I was able to chip in with 4 steals. Unfortunately for us it just wasn’t enough in the end. Let’s take a look at how the game went.

What didn’t go so well…

A consistent story-line for us this season has been our inconsistent starts. If we aren’t scoring well, then we’re locking the other team up, if we’re leaky on defense, we’re hitting everything we launch towards the basket. It just wouldn’t be right if we strayed from that on Saturday, and sure enough we stuck to the former, with an incredibly tight defense, but boy we could not hit water if we fell out of a boat, except for Nap and Jorel of course. We were also severly undermanned, with only two substitutes on the night with Zakai attending a family function and Kanye falling ill the day before. To add injury to insult (yes, in that order) Jericho was still recovering from his leg injury two games before, and I was playing through a torn oblique which I suffered against the Young Goatz. Even though we went on a pretty good run in the second quarter, tired legs caught up to us and once again we ended up playing catch-up going into the second half.

What went pretty well…

Despite the loss, we fought all the way through, and once our fate was sealed with 5 minutes to go in the fourth quarter, we actually went on a really solid run and pulled the deficit back to under 20 points (lol). During that time their bench mob started to get so flustered at our run that they started celebrating free-throws (again, lol)! But at the end of the day, it was all smiles and there were plenty of highlights which I’ll be sharing in our next edition. The camaraderie was on full display as we looked to battle back throughout the second half, but again, fatigue began to set in and we eventually just lost momentum.

Now with no more games this season, we wish the Splash Brothers all the best in the next round as they face off against The Answer, which should be a great match-up if both teams are fully fit! It has been a great season, albeit underwhelming in the end, but we had fun and I think we all learned a lot about each other as a team in the end.

I’ll be doing a season review/future outlook on the next season once those details are confirmed, so until then, I hope you enjoyed this mid-week review, look out for the next edition on Friday!

Enjoy the rest of your week!

Cheers!

Jason