Last season’s Super League basketball champions Ballincollig await Maigh Cuilinn's visit on Saturday.
After a storming start to the season when they comfortably won their opening three games, Ballincollig stumbled last weekend against Killester of Dublin and will be looking for a bounce-back performance against a Maigh Cuilinn team that also suffered defeat at home at the weekend.
While always likely to go down against table-toppers Belfast Star, Maigh Cuilinn can be relatively happy with a solid display that had them right in the contest up to the final buzzer. In the end Maigh Cuilinn lost by just 10 points, 64-74, while Ballincollig will be reeling with their surprise loss on their home court against Killester.
The champions had excellent displays from the stalwart brothers Adrian and Ciaran O’Sullivan, who combined for 29 points, but their usual high-scoring professional imports, Shawdale Jones Junior, Jordan Campbell and Nikola Rosa, failed to deliver, and, if Maigh Cuilinn are to have any chance on the road this Saturday, they will need to steal a trick from Killester and manage that same feat.
Ballincollig are beating teams on average by some 15 points so far this year and their trio of Jones, Campbell and Rosa have been dishing out much of the damage. As a team, Ballincollig are averaging north of 90 points per game and, although they have their defensive frailties, they have shown consistently over the past season that they can score at a level few teams can live with.
“Holding Ballincollig’s offence and in particular their attack in transition, is a really difficult task, but it’s those sorts of challenges the lads love and it’s the reason we fight so hard to stay in Superleague,” says Maigh Cuilinn coach John Cunningham.
“We have a bit more scoring firepower ourselves this year, so if we can shade a few points each quarter of what Ballincollig normally get, and go down to Cork with a decent shooting touch, we’ll give ourselves a chance.”
Maigh Cuilinn gave themselves a real shot of causing a major upset last weekend when a spellbinding third-quarter performance had the home faithful on their feet in the University of Galway Sports Arena and league leaders Belfast Star within sight.
A disappointing first half had left the Galway side with a small mountain to climb, trailing by 25-42, but a fast start after the interval saw them quickly reel that deficit back to just one point, thanks to scoring sprees from Grant Olsson, Antonio Molina and James Connaire.
while Daniel Jokubaitis and Rapolas Buivydas sparkled in Warriors’ 96-70 win against Bright St. Vincent’s. The results move both to 3-1 for the season and into a three-way tie at the top of the South Conference early in the campaign.
As can so often be the case however, Maigh Cuilinn repeatedly got just within touching distance, but never managed to actually regain the lead. And, after having all the momentum, they hovered at that one basket margin for some time before a dagger three-pointer from the impressive Aidan Quinn for Belfast at the death of the third quarter put Star back up by five.
In the early goings, DeOndre Jackson had been almost unstoppable for Belfast Star, but in the fourth quarter it was his compatriot Tamyrik Fields from Arizona in the USA who showed real class to find a series of game-clinching scores when the pressure mounted.
Maigh Cuilinn played well right to the end and still had a fighting chance going into the closing minutes, but with Fields in spectacular form for the Belfast Star attack, Maigh Cuilinn had nobody hitting quite those heights to answer, and it was Star who prevailed.
Maigh Cuilinn’s next home game is a National Cup first round encounter against University of Ulster which is being played in Leitir Móir’s Spórtlann Michael Mhóir at 6pm on Saturday, November 4.
Another Maree win
Maree BC enjoyed an emphatic 92-70 victory over EJ Sligo All-Stars. Charlie Crowley’s men had far too much for the Sligo outfit as they recorded their third win on the trot, and are currently tied at the top of the South Conference.
The result was never in doubt as they ran out 22-point winners with Carey the top scorer with 28 points. Next up for Maree is the visit of Neptune - the game to be played in Calasanctius College on Saturday (6pm ).
Meanwhile Titans, who were beaten in their first division contest 90-71 by Limerick Celtics in Knocknacarra, where they host SETU Waterford Vikings on Saturday (5pm ).
University of Galway Mystics fell to Killester by 91-79, and face a trip to Dublin to face Trinity Meteors at Trinity College on Saturday (4pm ).
