By Lai Chee Kwan

In January 2010, 30 teams started the North Zone B Division Boys Basketball Championship and by February 8th, 12 teams had qualified for the second round.

There were familiar names like North Vista Secondary, Presbyterian High, Woodlands Ring, Ahmad Ibrahim and Seng Kang Secondary. There were also dark horses like Yishun and Hougang Secondary. Three rising schools, Pei Hwa, Northland and Anderson Secondary made up the dozen.

In Group X, North Vista and Yishun were firm favourites to clinch the two semi-final spots. Northland, the other first round group winner, or ‘zheng meng’, was expected to provide the toughest challenge to the two. Woodlands Ring, Anderson and Yio Chu Kang were the group runners-up, or ‘fu meng’.

In Group Y, Presbyterian High, Christ Church and Hougang, as group winners, were matched against Seng Kang (who surprisingly lost to Northland in the first round), Ahmad Ibrahim and Pei Hwa.

Although North Vista have been tipped by many insiders to be this year's North Zone champions, and possibly national champions, focus was not on Group X. North Vista and Yishun both qualified for the semi-finals as with one game to spare.

It was in Group Y where high drama unfolded that caught everyone's attention. Right from day one, two ‘zheng mengs’ lost to ‘fu mengs’ – Seng Kang beat Hougang by one point and Ahmad Ibrahim defeated Presbyterian High by two.

This put Hougang and Presbyterian High in a precarious position as both had not played against any zheng-meng yet and another defeat would surely put paid to their hopes for advancing to the next round.

On day two, Hougang and Presbyterian High recovered to register their first victories against Pei Hwa and Christ Church respectively. Meanwhile, Ahmad Ibrahim lost to Seng Kang by five points, leaving Seng Kang the only unbeaten side in the group.

On day three, with both needing a win, Hougang edged out Ahmad Ibrahim by two points in a pulsating match. It was then Presbyterian High School's turn to grind out a nine-point victory over Pei Hwa.

With Christ Church's point guard out with a broken foot, everyone was expecting a Seng Kang victory but Christ Church defied all odds to thump Seng Kang 73-54.

In the words of a Red Sports reader, Group Y now became "damn complicated". No team had stayed unbeaten. Four teams each had two victories and one defeat. Even Ahmad Ibrahim, with two defeats, had an outside chance of qualifying.

On match day four, the pressure on the teams were mounting. Presbyterian High played above themselves to sweep aside the challenge of Hougang. Seng Kang were trailing by double digits at one point but eventually beat Pei Hwa by two points. Christ Church also survived the onslaught of the Ahmad Ibrahim juggernaut to win by four points.

Even with this result, the same four teams continued to stay in contention for the two spots. For the final match, a single victory by any of these three teams – Christ Church, Presbyterian High and Seng Kang, would assure qualification. Hougang had to beat Christ Church by at least 10 points and would also need Presbyterian High to win.

Against Seng Kang, Presbyterian High started strongly and were leading by 13 points at the end of the first quarter. However, they allowed Seng Kang to slowly claw their way back.

By the end of third quarter, Seng Kang were leading by one point. In the last quarter, Seng Kang surged forward and led by five points at one stage. With less than two minutes left, the Presbyterian point guard scored two crucial 3-pointers to lift his team for the final push to win by five points at the end.

Hougang, buoyed by this result, played hard against Christ Church, but were unable to reach their target and eventually lost by only two points.

The semi-finals will be held on Monday, March 1st, at Singapore Basketball Centre. North Vista will be playing against Christ Church at 3:00pm and Yishun will play against Presbyterian High at 4:30pm.

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(Image © Lai CK)

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