Rowe desperate for BBL Trophy success

The BBL Trophy Final begins in Plymouth this Sunday, the first time in its 26 year history that the title game has been staged over two legs.

The Raiders take on Newcastle Eagles, who will be looking to repeat their BBL Cup Final success over the south coasters, and keep on course for a clean sweep of trophies.

The format has come in from criticism from fans, particularly as last year’s event was held at the O2 Arena in London, on the same day as NBA game.

Raiders captain Anthony Rowe said: “It can work in your favour, and it’s good in tense that it isn’t over after one bad game. But if Eagles are within an arm’s reach will be tough up there. The tie is over 80 minutes, so the better team should win consistent over the two games.”

Plymouth picked up a morale boosting 85-76 win over the Eagles in the BBL Championship a fortnight ago, to give them hope of stopping the Newcastle trophy juggernaut.

Rowe added: “We’ve taken a lot of good things from the games against them, and we know we need to execute better. We need to stop them when they go on a run, but we want this Trophy pretty badly. They took the Cup and it looks like they’ve taken the league, so we really want this one.”

The final legs will be the fifth and sixth meetings between the two teams this season – the Eagles triumphed 90-67 in the league before Christmas, winning 103-94 on the road in February, with the 115-94 BBL Cup Final win sandwiched in between, before the Raiders broke their duck two weeks ago.

The BBL Trophy Final second leg takes place at Sport Central on Friday March 23rd.