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Game 1: Leicester @ Sacae
Let’s start with a revisit to the Sacae Center:
Glad to see we’re still speaking the truth here.
Sacae has hit a huge slide, moving from 9th in the standings up North to 12th, essentially out of contention. The most notable statistic for the team? They are the league worst 4-11 in games decided by under 10 points. They would still be a below average 12-16 not counting those games, but when the game is close, they usually fail to close out. The one exception being the Lyn half court game from earlier this season.
Leicester has had extreme roster turnover this season as well, with Raphael, Leonie, and Lorenz all taking extended times off with injury. A fortunate side effect of this is that a lot of Golden Deer have had expanded roster time, and that could benefit them in the playoffs. The downside? Well…
They have one of the worst defenses in the league, allowing 109 points a game.
And this game started out as a barn burner between the two squads, as Florina and Leonie both pushed the tempo in the 1st quarter:
(Leicester does have the most dynamic offense in the league, so they’ve been getting away with their mediocre defense)
The quarter would end with this Marianne three pointer, giving Leicester a 6 point lead going into the 2nd:
Leicester leads, 40-34.
Now, even though the Golden Deer have a bad defense, they do have one elite defensive player. Lorenz Hellman Gloucester has been one of the most inefficient shooters, he has spent 9 of the 13 weeks having some form of injury, and he lost his starting job to Marianne by week 2 of the season, but he is the only player on that team averaging any kind of significant defensive numbers:
His contributions early in the second quarter kept the Flash at bay when both Marianne and Leonie went into a shooting slump. And it was up to Lysithea and Hilda to push the team until one of them starting hitting shots again:
But for every shot Lysithea made, it seemed like Priscilla of all people was matching her:
The half ended with Leicester leading by 5, 74-69.
The 3rd quarter was rather uneventful, punctuated by 3 distinct plays:
Leicester had scored 3 straight baskets, but Hector’s hookshot here got them back into the game.
Nardel made great use of his limited minutes by finding this great alley oop from Claude!
Lysithea took a huge bump that would extend the lead to 7 points, which would end up being the exact points needed to win the game.
Leicester would end the quarter up 7, 97-90.
Lorenz would start the 4th with his only points of the game:
And Leonie would get a huge steal and score in the next possession:
At this point, it was 101-90, and the game looked to be over.
But then the Sacae defense would take over, and slow the game down immensely. They started using the whole shot clock, and Leicester’s rhythm disappeared, and the Flash mounted a huge comeback, mostly off of free throws that the Golden Deer gave. It was now 115-111, and Sacae had a chance to cut the lead to 2:
But with only 25 seconds left, it seemed like all they could do was foul and hope for the best, until:
A huge unforced error gave Sacae the ball, only down 2, with 17 seconds left.
It was then that the game must have bugged out or something, because as soon as Florina got the ball:
Nobody ran a play, nobody went for the ball, and Florina dribbled the clock out. With a chance to win the game. The only thing I can think is that Sacae was out of timeouts at this point, and maybe the AI crossed itself trying to figure out what to do?
Anyways, Sacae is now 4-12 in games decided by less than 10 points, and Leicester escapes the Sacae Center with a huge win.
The game ends, 115-113 Leicester.