| Getting a Little Too Cute |
Jan 28, 2008 |
The title is what the organizers thought of Inshirah’s moves prior to the game, shaking up their starting line-ups to try something different. Veterans would say to leave that kind of tinkering to the regular season and not the semi-finals!
We aren’t sure of the thinking behind it, or if the goals of doing so were met, but if we were to judge things by what we saw on the court we would recommend sticking with the line-up that worked in the regular season.
As we had previewed, these 2 teams met in the first week of the regular season, with Inshirah pounding Bayyina, doubling them 48-24. This game was a lot closer. Inshirah decided to sit big men Inderbir and Shazie to start the game and they didn’t enter until well past the 10 minute mark of the half. Messing with the line-ups predictably ruined Inshirah’s flow and the score was only 5-3 after the 10 minute mark; though well rested, even the organizers found themselves yawning uncontrollably at this point. The score ended with Inshirah up 12-6 at the half led by Inderbir’s 5 points. Bayyina was lead by David’s 5 points.
Enough has been said of Inshirah’s tinkering. But what about Bayyina? They needed a big game from Mishaal if they wanted to pull out the upset, and Inshirah was definitely ripe for one the way they played in the 1st half. But what was up with Bayyina’s 6 points? Particularly since David scored 5 of them? Bayyina didn’t look in sync at all, they weren’t feeding the post either, and Mishaal and Jibran found themselves in foul trouble with 3 apiece preventing them from being on the court simultaneously and allowing Inshirah to hammer them on the offensive boards.
We were expecting the same flow in the 2nd half when we saw Inshirah stubbornly stuck with their game plan to divide their starting 5. But Waqas decided he was going to excite things up a bit and played as if Bayyina had pulled a Zidane on him! Waqas went bananas on Bayyina, scoring 12 points, 5 rebounds, and 2 steals all in a 5 minute span to start the half. Its tough to say if another Inshirah player even scored a point in that span. Frustration seemed to boil over for Bayyina as Hacker leader Jibran committed his 5th foul at the 14 minute mark, a needless clothesline of the 3-point shooter. The unnecessary foul compounded his team’s problem as he forfeited his team’s only other rebounder, left Inshirah with 3 free throws, and almost got an additional technical for tearing off his shirt and tossing it off the court in disgust (but the refs decided to just let it go at this point of the game).
Bayyina called a timeout with 13:39 left and down 26-10. Bayyina started to make things a bit more interesting over the next little while as they cut the lead to 29-23 with 7 minutes left, but Inshirah was able to weather the storm and Bayyina had to call their final timeout with 3:37 left and down 34-25. Bayyina could do no more and eventually lost the game 38-29. Inshirah will now face Kursi in next week’s championship game in what will be the two team’s tie breaker as both won once against the other in the regular season. |
