2013/14 Game Report
Game:
Competition:
Date:
Newcastle Eagles Under 18 Men vs. Northampton Thunder Under 18 Men
EBL Under 18’s North Premier
18th January 2014
Score:
Newcastle Eagles Under 18’s- 108, Northampton Thunder Under 18’s- 65
The Eagles looking to bounce back from two close defeats were playing in black against the mid table Thunder in
red… Again there was a sizeable crowd at the Westgate Centre for Sport for the 2.30pm tip off…
The Eagles set about their opponents from the start and some good pressure defence had the desired effect as the
home team jumped out in the lead and by the mid point of the 1st period they were 16 to 8 up… The latter 5 minutes
was more of the same as the home team outscored the Thunder by 16 to 9 closing the quarter at 32 to 17…
The Eagles were not in the mood to let things go easily and with both Eddie Matthew and Ryan France back in the
team they poured on the visitor’s misery. They continued to force errors and turn over’s from the boys in red and
with some slick offence they took the 2nd period by 28 to 15… Making it Eagles 60 Thunder 32 at the half time…
The game was being played at a high tempo mainly injected by the home team’s defensive intensity but both teams
were playing in great spirits… The 3rd quarter was a much closer affair as the visitors started to make in roads into
the Eagles defence and some poor decisions offensively were also helping the Thunder contain the score line… In the
8th minute of the period the Northants coach was ejected from the game for continued decent towards the officials
not helping his teams situation…
The Eagles claimed the period by a score line of 22 to 20 making it 82 to 52 going into the last 10 minutes…
The 4th quarter saw Coach Heath challenge his players to pick up the intensity and not allow the visitors to exceed
the team defensive target of 64… The game in the early stages of the period was considerably more physical than it
had been and on the 4th minute it boiled over a little with Andrew Dorothy receiving his marching orders for decent
after getting between Tait of the Eagles and Virdee of the Thunder…. However Virdee soon followed him out of the
game as after being substituted his temper and language got the better of him and he was also dismissed by the
officials… After this the game seemed to lose its way a bit and the Eagles dominated the scoring and it was only a
poor rotation in the 9th minute allowed the Thunder to edge onto 65… The Eagles took the period by a score of 26 to
13 and closed out the game at 108 to 65…
Coach Heath said afterwards we played great basketball today and showed again how we can dominate teams when
in the right frame of mind… It was good to have Eddie and Ryan back in the side and also Aaron Wilson playing up
from the U16s instead of the injured Marko Amezaga-Kutija contributed 6 points and some good reads and boards…
We now move onto next week and a tough road trip in Manchester against Trafford… Wilson will again play in both
games…
Eagles Top Scorers- Eddie Matthew 40, Gregor Gray 21, Ryan France 13…