The start of storm Dennis meant that only one of the Kings scheduled British Wheelchair Basketball national league games took place this weekend. With the Thames Valley Kings first team taking on London Titans seconds in Division 1 South with the Kings hoping to maintain their unbeaten record.
Kings won the tip and went into an early lead with baskets from George Gray and Liam Barker as they put Titans under a lot of pressure and it paid off with Tom Tobin and Reece Barker scoring 16 points between them to help take Kings into a 22-8 lead at the break.
Kings came out in the second quarter and continued with their high defence press on Titans restricting them to just four points in the whole quarter. At the other end, Kings couldn’t stop scoring, with Adele Atkin and PJ O’Dovovan getting their first points of the game and Tobin, Gray and Liam Barker all adding to their tallies and going into the halftime break leading 40-12.
Kings started slowly in the third quarter and Titans took advantage of this having their best quarter of the game but Kings managed to find their rhythm and composure finding the basket and locking down their defence towards the end of it, taking a 21 point lead into the final quarter at 51-30.
The fourth quarter saw Kings up the tempo again with the Barker Brothers, O’Donovan, Atkin and Tobin all adding to their tallies and taking the win for Kings to 69-43.
With that win, Kings move to the top of the British Wheelchair Basketball Division 1 league table. Kings head coach Grant Barker said, “He was delighted with the win and the first-half performance was some of the best basketball we have played all season.”
The second team’s scheduled game against the Derby Wheelblazers was called off due to travel concerns from the away team, however, the London Titans and Kings did manage to organise a last-minute friendly to replace that game.
The friendly saw Kings and Titans both play younger Junior level players for court experience alongside their respective Division Three teams. Kings Junior, Josh Trotter made his full debut under a Kings jersey at just 10 years old and also managed to find the basket in the 3rd quarter to pick up his first points as well. Titans won the Friendly in a close end-to-end match, 31-25.
