Dublin Lions celebrate their victory with the trophy, (Right) Dublin Lions saw off St Brendan’s Tralee in the Billy Coffey Cup final
Photos by ©INPHO/Tom Maher
Lions U18s roar in final
DUBLIN Lions were victorious in the final of the Billy Coffey U18 Men’s National Cup at the National Basketball Arena last Saturday as they defeated St Brendan’s Tralee comprehensively with a scoreline of 99-54.
Both sides started strong in the contest with St Brendan’s gaining a slight advantage early on.
It would be MVP of the game Mykyta Hural who cemented Lions in the driving seat at the end of the first with his basket at the end of the quarter giving them a solid 24-18 lead.
The second quarter started similarly to the first with the game being played at a frightening pace. As the quarter wore on St Brendan’s had worked their way back into the game and at one point only found themselves down by a single point with the scoreline reading 33-32.
The final four minutes however saw Lions pull away for not only the second quarter but essentially changed the momentum for the rest of the game as a whole.
Thanks to the work of Shareef Elmahi and Majust Raziunas they managed an impressive 17 points in this four minute period with St Brendans scoring just two in comparison.
The scoring spree saw Lions lead by a 51-34 with the side from Clondalkin now firmly ahead of their opposition with spirits running high.
The third quarter saw Dublin Lions extend their lead further, scoring six unanswered points at the start of the period saw them build up their lead to a commanding 35 points with six different players all contributing to the scoring tally throughout the third quarter. They finished up their third ahead by an 81-46 margin.
The final quarter was a formality more than anything as the result of the game was no longer in doubt.
In fairness to St Brendans they did not stop coming forward with scores from Paddy Lucid and Kevin O’Shea making the score 87-52 with six minutes to go.
It was too big of a mountain to climb however and Lions would run out as decisive winners with the final scoreline reading 99-54, securing them the Billy Coffey cup.
Mykyta Hural would pick up MVP for Dublin Lions on the day with an impressive tally of 26 points and 12 rebounds.
There were a number of excellent performances for the club with five players ending up in the double digits scoring wise.
Along with Hural, Markas Mikalickas had an excellent game managing 24 points while Majust Raziunas was one behind on 23 while Shareef Elmahi had a hugely impressive 19 rebounds to go along with his 13 points.
