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Smooth sailing for IOB

By Our Special Correspondent

Central Excise's Isac Verghese (right) being blocked by MEG's M.R. Prasanth in the Ace IOB-Magnolia Trophy in Chennai on Thursday.

CHENNAI Aug. 8. Indian Overseas Bank, Chennai, defeated Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, Dehradun, 82-60 in the quarterfinals of the Ace IOB-Magnolia Trophy All-India men's basketball tournament at the Montfort indoor stadium, Santhome, here on Thursday. Central Excise, Kochi, Tata Iron and Steel Company (TISCO) and Indian Bank also entered the semifinals.

Central Excise, trailing 32-36 at half time, staged a dramatic comeback in the second half to down Madras Engineering Group, Bangalore, at 79-62 and TISCO, struggling in the first session, overtook Western Railway in the third quarter and then edged out the rival in an exciting finish at 69-65.

Indian Bank hung on to its early lead to beat DLW, Varanasi, at 64-52 in the last quarterfinal match.

IOB, yet to face serious challenge in this competition, began rather casually in the first 10 minutes. ONGC kept the pace in scoring, but IOB broke away in the final minutes to finish that session with a 30-19 advantage. However, ONGC did well in the second quarter improving its defence. Its close marking and better rebound collection helped it to cut down the lead.

In fact, IOB's game tended to be casual as the match wore on. Still it stretched the lead to 29 points at one stage in the third session. But Nishant Kumar, Suresh Kumar and Anub Minz helped ONGC reduce the lead with some long shots. However, the failure of Pardeep Randhawa affected the Dehradun team's scoring percentage.

IOB started with pivot game and then tried long shots, maintaining the 20-point lead. ONGC was caught off guard in the beginning as the full IOB side outplayed it with its strong attack and defence. Robinson, Shabeer Ahmed, Sundar, Chandrasekar and Hariharasudan combined smoothly to set the pace. Under pressure the ONGC players showed reluctance to take long shots. But when IOB switched to non-pivot game, ONGC's scoring improved and in the fourth quarter it collected 16 points against IOB's 14.

A tactical blunder would have cost Excise the match. It was trailing against the Armymen who were fast in basketting. The Kochi side was rattled at half time. However, the team coach sent in Isac Varghese and Raja Tomy as substitutes and they converted some three pointers that virtually swung the match in Excise's favour.

Despite its height advantage because of Subash Shenoy and Vivek, Excise should have tried more long shots in the beginning. But it was a rather late decision to send in good shooters.

MEG's problem was that it did not have tall players to go for rebounds and its shooting also depended on only one or two players. That affected MEG's chances in the latter half of the match, despite setting up good pace and systematic game in the first half.

It was a clash between experienced Western Railway and the youthful TISCO. But the young boys showed more wisdom in getting past the seasoned side. TISCO was trailing but it did not allow the Railway team to breakaway. It mixed its long shots with close lay-ups and the margin of lead was not more than one or two baskets. Mohit Bandari, Desraj and Riazuddin were not ruffled by the tight marking and managed some room to shoot.

TISCO was trailing 34-39 at half time, but its game improved tremendously in the third session. The young boys began to put pressure on the rival with fast break and three pointers. They were cutting through the rival defence at will. It surged ahead in the third quarter. However, Western Railway rallied strongly to cut down the lead to 64-63, but missed an easy lay-up. That helped the Jamshedpur side to edge past the rival.

IOB will take on Central Excise and Indian Bank will meet TISCO in the semifinals.

After taking a 10-point lead through its strong defence, Indian Bank managed to maintain it and in the second half, DLW cut down the lead to nine points, but the Bankmen stretched the advantage to over 10 points in the last four minutes. At half time India Bank led 33-19.

The results (quarterfinals): TISCO 69 (Mohit Bandari 18, Desraj 15, Riazuddin 17, WAsim Khan 10) bt Western Railway 65 (Ranjit Singh 20, Surjit Singh 12, Ramkumar 19).

IOB 82 (Hariharasudan 14, Sivashankar 24, Shabeer Ahmed 12, Sridhar 13) bt ONGC 60 (Suresh Kumar 14, Anub Minz 13, Nishant Kumar 19).

Central Excise, Kochi, 79 (Joseph John 13, Isac Varghese 12, Raja Tomy 13, Subash Shenoy 30) bt MEG, Bangalore, 62 (Harsha 10, Prashanth 23, Arokya Babu 17).

Indian Bank 64 (Saravanan 13, C.V. Sunny 20, Sukavaneshwar 19) bt DLW, Varanasi, 52 (Mihir Pandey 15, Satish 10).

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