After a month away, BBL Shorts returns. Don’t forget you can send us your snippets to news@bblfans.com
Newcastle back in the trophies
So they had a season off them, but Newcastle Eagles are now firmly back on the silverware trail, picking up their first at the weekend, beating Plymouth 115-94. They’ve certainly regained their hunger (did it ever go missing?) and it would take a brave man to bet against them for the rest of the season. Messrs Love, Paternostro and James – it’s down to you to stop them.
Foul trouble
It was a bad weekend for Plymouth. They didn’t play a bad game, but they had no answer to Newcastle’s offensive dominance. But it turns out the Raiders weren’t too happy with the refereeing for the big occasion, tweeting shortly before the end of the game “Mike Ojo fouls out of the game. We do have three of the worst refs the @BBLofficial could have found for this Cup final! Great job BBL.” Officials come under much criticism in the BBL at times, and there’ll be a few people looking at the tapes this week with interest. But it’s in the record books now, and there’s nothing you can do but to look ahead.
SKY coverage
It was great to see the BBL Cup Final covered live by SKY Sports, and it surely can’t be too long before more live regular season games are shown. While it’s great even to have “as-live” games televised, the drama and excitement simply isn’t there compared to watching live. I don’t quite understand why SKY do it – there is surely room in the schedule for live matches even weekly from the BBL. I was also impressed by Rob Paternostro and Tony Garbelotto’s contributions to the SKY coverage, two very knowledgable and passionate BBL personalities.
New Manchester team set for BBL
It’s been on the cards for a while, but it was reported at the weekend that Manchester Giants have officially applied to join the BBL next season. With a team from Birmingham also set to join the league, 2012/13 could be the most exciting season yet. London Leopards have also submitted an application, although there is a question mark over at least one of the existing BBL clubs and whether they will make it to even the end of this season, let alone the start of next.
Our very own record breaker
I must take this opportunity to pass on congratulations to BBL Fans columnist and Mersey Tigers captain David Aliu, who reached 100 BBL Championship appearances for his hometown club at the weekend. He has been breaking club records galore this season, becoming the first Tiger ever to reach 1000 points for the club. Here’s hoping they can string a few wins together for his sake over the coming weeks.
