Punjab Police cagers huff and puff before winning

Chandigarh, Sep 30 (UNI) Punjab Police huffed and puffed before winning by 53-48 against Rail Coach Factory in the 18th Punjab Annual Basketball League (Ist leg) for Men and Women, being played at village Gure in Ludhiana district.

The Railway team led in first two quarters and had tied the score at the end of third quarter but lost the match in the fourth quarter only. At the end of first quarter, RCF were leading by 10-7 and at the end first half, they were still leading by 29-25. At the end of third quarter, RCF and Punjab Police were equal with 41 points each.

In the fourth quarter, both the teams playing very aggressive pressure defense matched point for point. With 40 seconds left, the score was equal with 45 each. In the last minute, Bhupinder Singh scored two free throws and gave a lead of two points to the Police team. Immediately, Harsh of RCF scored a three-point shot and gave one point lead to RCF. Bhupinder Singh of the Police team scored two consecutive three-point shots and gave Punjab Police a hard-earned victory.

In another match, Rest of Punjab men bulldozed Diesel Motors Workshop, Patiala by 80-38 points. The Patiala players could not penetrate the tough zone defense set by Rest of Punjab men, who were having seven feet tall Yatan Sharma as giant defense in the middle of restricted area. Mandeep Singh and international Rajan Sharma excelled in shooting.

The Patiala team having seasoned players Pawandeep Singh and Gurpal Pali could not match up to young Rest of Punjab team. For Rest of Punjab, Mandeep Singh (captain, 27 points), Rajan Sharma (19), Gurpreet (19) and Yatan Sharma (15) were main scorers. For Railway team, Patiala, Manjeet (12), Pawandeep Singh (12) and Gurpal Pali (5) were the main scorers.

In the women's section, Ludhiana beat Kapurthala women to win the match by 89-64.

For Ludhiana, international player Kiranjeet Kaur scored 37 points and she was ably assisted by another international player Nagma (17) and Harminder (10), Sukhjinder (7), Chandeep (8) and Harpreet (6) and for Kapurthala, Mandeep (17), Rajwinder (16), Preeti (14), Gori (7) and Baljinder (5) were main scorers.

In the league table, in men's section, Punjab Police were leading points table six points.

Ludhiana women were leading with four points.

UNI XC PS PY HT1650