Date:18/06/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/06/18/stories/2007061801461900.htm

Sport - Basketball

Chhattisgarh boys and girls enter semifinals

Special Correspondent

It was smooth sailing for the holders, U.P. boys and Chhattisgarh girls, to the junior National basketball championships semifinals here on Sunday.

Joining them were Tamil Nadu, Chhattisgarh boys and Kerala girls.

A splendid solo streak by Tamil Nadu's Akilan saw his side wrest the initiative from Punjab boys.

The sides were tied at 66 at full time but TN prevailed in extra time with a thrilling 73-71 win after trailing 24-34 at half-time.

The Chhattisgarh boys ensured they separated themselves from Rajasthan by at least 10 points right through to their 86-71 victory.

A trio of three-pointers from way beyond the D by Rajasthan's Govind was spectacular but couldn't avert the inevitable.

Height advantage

The Andhra Pradesh girls tried and succeeded to some extent in containing Delhi till half-time.

Swarming the rival semicircle helped Delhi call the shots against a scattered AP attack toiling to beat defenders taller on an average by at least a foot.

The northern side's abundant bench strength and its domination of both the boards vis-à-vis the rebounds, had the host running out of steam in a losing battle.

Karnataka girls rarely used their resources to snatch the rebounds.

Instead, they allowed the marauding Chhattisgarh forward line to pound their backboard.

International Pushpa, handing out the assists often or taking the occasional hit from 'outside' forced the pace in the reigning champion's favour.

The results (quarterfinals):

Boys:

TN 73 (Ramakrishna 19, Guruprasad 16, Akilan 17, Satish 10) bt Punjab 71 (Lakhbir 22, Lovedeep 20, Syed S.A. 14); Chhattisgarh 86 (Kiranpal 25, Pratham 22, Santosh 17) bt Rajasthan 71 (Hirendra 17, Geo Verghese 17, Govind 14); U.P. 88 (Visesh 19, Arjun 19, Sukhinder 15) bt Kerala 49 (Umesh 15, Sijoy 12); Delhi 94 (Sunil 28, Shiv 21, Nitin 15, Amit 11, Vinay 10) bt Maharashtra 76 (Kaustabh 21, Sameer 17).

Girls:

Chhattisgarh 80 (Pushpa 28, Manjeeta 10, Kavita 10) bt Karnataka 53 (Krutika 16, Reeth 15, Sneha 14); Delhi 61 (Pratima 24, Raspreet 16, Akansha 10) bt AP 38 (Kavljit 16); Kerala 56 (Anu K.S. 15, Seena 10, Ashey 10) bt Punjab 36 (Sukhjinder 12, Harneet Kaur 11).