Barracudas suffer second straight home loss.

photo above: Hope turns to agony after the loss to the visitors for Mike Pilgrim, the Barracudas American import.


BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN – The Singapore Slingers sends the Brunei Barracudas to its second consecutive home loss in the Asean Basketball League (ABL) last night. Final score 82-80. The win puts the Slingers on top of the team standings with 3-0 card while the Barracudas fell to 1-3.
It’s quite (almost) the same story from their first encounter. The Barracudas manage to control the tempo and led mostly in the first two quarters and then they couldn’t handle choking pressure of man-to-man defense by the visitors applied in the last two quarters. The visitors pressured the ball handlers and denying every entry pass to the post. The pressure forced the Barracudas to commit turnover after turnover.

Any chance for the Barracudas comeback in front of the home crowd was foiled by an inability to get shot to fall from the inside, outside and most of all from the free throw line. The Barracudas is only 56% from the charity stripe while the Slingers had 75%. The paint was basically controlled by the Barracudas, 38 from opponents 28 but second chance points goes to the visitors.
Every time the Barracudas would pick up momentum – a 3-pointer or two consecutive baskets – The Slingers would come right back down the floor and snag a pair of free throws. 

When we talk about size, the Barracudas actually has the advantage over the visitors, Don Camaso had his chance most of the time posting the smaller guards of the Slingers but he failed to capitalized and limit himself to only 5 points. It may look like an advantage to them but when the possession changes, the Barracudas had trouble with the opponents dribble penetration style. Nothing hurts a team defense more than dribble penetration because it forces the Barracudas inside players to help and recover and they failed on that.

Slingers led by Michael Leblanc’s 32 points and 5 boards followed by 17 points and 9 rebounds of Kyle Jeffers. Filipino import Al Vergara contributed 15 points and dished 4 assists for the visitors.

Leo Avenido top-scored the Barracudas with 20 points, 17 points for Lonnie Jones who showed inside aggressiveness in the early period, grabbed 6 rebounds and 3 blocks while Mike Pilgrim added 16 points, 11 boards and 4 assists shy for triple-doubles. Benjamin Sim added 5 points who is coming off from the bench.

The team must now regroup, starting again in practice this week leading to another away game on the 31st, this time against the Patriots of the Philippines.

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