Mark
Woods
BBL Championship
Final (Wembley)
When the chips were
down, Chester still couldn't be knocked off their stride.
The Northgate outfit
are, deservedly, the 2002 BBL Champions, emerging from a tough battle at
Wembley with a hard-won 93-82 victory over Sheffield Sharks to become only
the third side in the league's history to sweep every piece of major silverware
- adding the Wembley title to the Cup, Trophy and Northern Conference crowns.
Jets coach Robbie
Peers summed up what has been a fairytale campaign for a team which in
years past, had been so accustomed to bouncing perennially along at the
other end of the standings.
"For us to win all
four titles on a budget of virtually nothing - you won't find anything
like that anywhere in sport."
Nor in British basketball,
where even the Cinderella cause of Leicester 12 months ago bears little
comparison with the feats of a Chester side who rarely ran six deep but
whose heart and soul proved bigger than than of any opponent.
“Everybody’s been
talking about the clean sweep, but it seemed impossible to me," Peers added.
"You have to win too many big games to do it, so I can’t believe that we
have managed it.”
Sheffield started
the stronger opening with the first five points of the game, but Chester
stormed back and took an early cushion thanks to a quick 7-0 burst but
the Sharks rode some hot early outside shooting from Jeff Monaco to trail
only 20-19 after the opening stanza.
Struggling against
Sheffield's pressure, Jets were unable to establish the kind of dominance
which had brought them so much success throughout this campaign but John
McCord - previously a runner-up here with Thames Valley - guided the Northgate
outfit into a 39-30 lead before nine unanswered points from the underdogs
put them in front once more.
James Hamilton's
buzzer beating jumper sent Robbie Peers' men into the interval up 45-43
and they found some further relief by adding the first six of the second
half.
Another 11-2 spurt
for Chester, spurred by the majestic Pero Cameron, opened a 62-51 lead
for the history-chasers but they were under severe pressure, Hamilton controversially
avoiding an ejection after shoving Iain McKinney in the face - both players,
incredibly,assessed for technical fouls.
Escaping what could,
and probably should, have been a fatal loss of their All-Star, the Jets
allowed Sheffield clawed it back to three at 62-59 with an 8-0 burst of
their own, but Chester went into the final quarter up 68-61.
However Chester withstood
a barrage from Mike Payne and never allowed the never-say-die Sharks to
come closer than four points early in the fourth quarter with MVP McCord
leading all scorers with 31 points.
It was a cruise in
the final moments as Sheffield suffered the indignity of their second successive
championship final defeat and their sixth defeat in a row at Wembley in
what could be the last BBL final held at the capital venue.
However with Chester's
starting five playing all but four minutes, the result was immediately
overshadowed by Hamilton's fortunate reprieve which had proved such a huge
factor.
"Chester were the
better team," Sharks coach Chris Finch said. "But that was absolutely despicable
game management by those referees. What led to that was an incident three
seconds earlier where Hamilton was elbowing our guards.
"The refs didn't
call that, Chester broke and we made the hard foul, our guy was punched
and ended up with a worse punishment than Hamilton. It was a typical, bail-out,
garbage BBL call."
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