Bishops and Halswell in Torino
World Masters
The World Masters Basketball Torino Italy
The World Masters games have been held recently in Torino Italy and there was good representation from Cantabrians. The Bishops containing many of the original members have been involved along with half a Halswell Womens team Lynne Brand, Lynda Massie, Marinda Van Vuuren, Carol Lightfoot, Team Manager Barbara Smith. The other half are Australians.
We have been receiving reports from Murray Kennedy from The Bishops about their progress. The Bishops team derived from the old University squad who was coached by ex NZ Coach Bob Bishop in our local Premier competition. The team itself contained some well known locals with ex Rams Tony Romano, Ralph Lattimore and Deiderick Vanheyningen . Former CBA Board member John Deely, out of towners Dave Decker (Wellington) Alen Stenhouse (Germany) and current midweekers Murray Kennedy, Dave Baird and Richard Floyd.
Murray Kennedy described the action.
The Bishops have had one win against Hungary, and losses to Estonia and Venezuela so far. Russia tomorrow, who have 7 foot twins and are unbeaten. Not hopeful. 38° today! 5 games to go...
Russian Game
We lost by quite a few points but enjoyed it a lot. Turns out the Russian team is all in their 30's and all are ex-professionals. The two 7 footers were a challenge but so were the two 6-10ers and the 6-8ers and the guards that hardly missed a jump shot! The first play of the game perhaps summed it up- the Russians ran a back door play that resulted in a two handed dunk over Dave Dekker, our tallest player at 6' 8". It is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BovN6Y_zzl8;hd=1
For many of us this was the best team we'd ever played against so we took a lot out of it. Today we have a must-win game against Hungary to advance to the semis. We beat Hungary by 1 in our first meeting.Hopefully we'll have good news tomorrow!
Hungary Game
Yesterday was a must-win game for us against Hungary. We didn't start well, trailing by 8 points early, then had a great 2nd quarter to be up by 25 at the half. The second half started very badly with Alan Stenhouse badly injured (ankle) and them getting back to within 10. Ralph Lattimore and Richard both fouling out, then only a 6 point lead in the fourth quarter. But level heads prevailed and we ended up winning by 15. Our favourite German supporters showed up again, and naturally there were big celebrations back at Cascina Vignole.
That got us into the semi finals which means we play Russia today, then (assuming we lose that game) we would have a 3rd/4th playoff against either Estonia or Venezuela.
Sadly it looks like Alan is out for the tournament and there are a lot of other very tired bodies, kept going by Volatarin!
Semi Final
The semi final against Russia went largely as expected... they beat us convincingly. In the end. We actually stayed with them for the first half, but there was some inevitability about the result. Some video included here.
What wasn't expected was Richard's knee exploding in the last minute of the game and him being ambulanced to hospital. He has a fractured patella and is making plans to get home asap.
On arrival back to base he was greeted with various expressions of sympathy...
With JD's cracked rib, Stenhouse’s Ankle we're down from 9 players to 6.5!
Halswell Girls
Barbara Smith, Marinda Van Vuuren, Linda Massie, Lyn Brand, Carol Lightfoot joined up with some Australian girls from Canberra to compete in the womens grade at the World Masters in Italy. So far they have had 3 Games 3 Wins. Playing Russia tomorrow.
We played the Russians last night in what I could only describe as the best basketball ever. They were a superb team of highly skilled players. We WON SILVER.
Our tallest player was shorter than 3 of their shortest players.!!!
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