On Tuesday the side travelled to Walsall to take on Pool Hayes Community School in the last 16 tie which saw us come out 51-42 winners in a pretty one sided and very scrappy game against a well organised zone defence. This then set up a quarter final place with one of the country's top teams in Burleigh Community College, Loughborough. The school is a Basketball Academy linked with the Leicester Riders.
The game was always going to be tough but off the back of a convincing win, the team was full of confidence. We started strong and quickly established a 4 point lead. Burleigh began by shooting the ball well, which meant we had to shift to a much tighter man to man defence. Michael Stubbs continued to dominate in the key and drew a number of fouls as well as forcing himself inside to score off a number of strong drives. The Burleigh defence saw this as a threat and began to double team Stubbs which gave Moody, Ryan and Marshal opportunities to attack. As the game drew to an end Burleigh's outside shooting took over and saw us 6 down with 2 minutes to play. The game became a 4 point game but eventually slipped away as time ran out.
The team have achieved so much in such a short space of time and have literally put Sandringham school on the basketball map. Congratulations and let's hope next year is even more successful.
The team:
Michael Stubbs
Riley Griffin
Charlie Marshal
George Holley
John Little
Jacob Moody
Oli Ryan
Sam Tanton
Max Hood
Will Holland
Leo Stamatiou
