Basketball: Second loss in a weekend for S’pore Slingers
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Kentrell Barkley finished with a game-high 29 points but it was not enough as the Singapore Slingers lost 87-79 to Zamboanga Valientes.
ST PHOTO: KEVIN LIM
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SINGAPORE – For 18 minutes on Sunday, the Singapore Slingers were firmly in the driver’s seat in their bid to bounce back from their first loss in the 2023 Asean Basketball League (ABL) Invitational to Hong Kong Eastern the day before.
They had amassed a healthy 11-point lead against Filipino team Zamboanga Valientes with less than two minutes to go in the second quarter.
But their game started to fall apart and they eventually lost 87-79 at the final buzzer to bookend a poor weekend at the OCBC Arena, where they slumped to their second defeat in as many games.
Coach Neo Beng Siang bemoaned the players’ poor defensive and offensive display, noting that fatigue from playing back-to-back games could have been a factor.
He said: “Towards the end, we didn’t play as a team and we were a bit selfish today, they didn’t follow the game plan.
“They started well because they picked up their defence but after leading 8-0, they became sloppy and everything fell apart.”
The Slingers had come out with their guns blazing as they poured in eight points but that momentum was lost after a time-out just three minutes in, as Valientes matched the Slingers basket for basket as the first quarter ended 28-20.
Little separated both sides in the second quarter until the last two minutes, when their Filipino rivals capitalised on the Slingers’ sloppy defence to score nine consecutive points, reducing their deficit to just two as they trailed 49-47 at half-time.
Jeremy Arthur’s nifty step-back jumper gave Valientes the lead once the third quarter opened and the visitors never relinquished it, outscoring the hosts 20-12 to lead 67-61, before eventually triumphing by an eight-point margin.
The Slingers struggled to convert their shots throughout, making just 31 out of 84 field-goal attempts (36.9 per cent), compared to the Filipino side’s 36 of 70 (51.4 per cent).
The misses were costly for the home team, allowing their opponents to launch quick transitions, particularly in the fourth quarter when the Slingers converted just eight of 24 attempts.
American Kentrell Barkley
Fellow import Xavier Alexander
Xavier Alexander attempts to score as the Singapore Slingers lost 87-79 to Zamboanga Valientes.
ST PHOTO: KEVIN LIM
Delvin Goh, 27, was the best-performing local with 12 points and five rebounds. He said: “We didn’t follow the plan and didn’t do our best. We stopped running and doing things that worked well.
“We fell short ourselves rather than (having them) beat us. But it’s just going to go up from here, we’ll try to regroup, go to Batam and come up with four wins.
The players will also have to get used to the increased aggression from their Filipino and Hong Kong opponents, said Barkley and Goh.
Barkley, 26, called for the team to “lock in mentally for the whole 40 minutes”.
“We took mental breaks (in the third quarter) and that’s when the opponents got to score. When we go back to practice, we have to focus on that,” he said.
“We just have to move on to the next day and get ready for Indonesia so we can play the best we can for the fans and for ourselves.”
While Neo said coming away from their home tournament with a 2-2 record will affect their bid for a first ABL title, he added: “There’s still a long way to go... We still have to tell them to stay positive, keep working and pushing one another – that’s the only way to help them.”
The ABL next moves to Batam from Jan 12 to 18, the second of four rolling tournaments this season. The best-of-five semi-finals and finals, which will be announced soon, will take place at a central venue.
