The game could have gone either way but Riyadh Stars, their collective backs to the wall after a loss away to Dammam Oilers, seemed to want it more and won the evening thriller in the TFC Kingdom Cup semifinals basketball tournament before another overflow crowd at the Sheraton Sport Complex court last Friday.
The Stars, who have had to request practice at 5 in the morning just hours after arriving from Riyadh Thursday night to underline the urgency of their mission, edged out the FBA Vipers 90-88 in a down to the wire contest.
Cat-quick guard Raymond Alcasabas delivered the lethal blows for the visitors, hitting 20 points including a critical basket in the last 28 seconds to go with five assists and six rebounds.
Big men Roel Asay and James Smith both threw their weight around in the shaded area to score 19 and 17 points with 6 and 10 rebounds respectively for the Stars who engaged the hosts in a whale of a battle to the delight of the basketball-batty OFWs.
The deadly Riyadh trio created problems for Jeddah Vipers coach Boy “4GS” Corsega who is expected to make adjustments to try and win the teams’ return bout next Friday in Riyadh.
Premier point guard Robby David, the Vipers’ go-to guy, delivered a double-double performance of 21 points and 10 assists including two pinpoint passes that set up Morsie Akad and Joseph Ubalde with last-gasp threes that kept the game interesting to the very end.
Akad, his game finally coming together in his last two starts, had 21 points including five from beyond the arc. Ubalde also had a double-double with 16 points and 10 rebounds to go with 4 assists.
The result left all three teams tied at 1-1at the end of the first phase of the double round robin home-and-away semis and threw the race wide open for the two championship spots. At this stage, however, the Oilers have +8, Vipers 0 and Stars –8 in the tiebreak points system in case it needed to be applied when this round to pick the two finalists is ended.
The Vipers who won their first semifinal game away to the Oilers erased a 13-point first quarter deficit and, thanks to their resiliency, would counter with a run of their own each time the enemy pulls away.
The Vipers led for the first time, 42-40, at the end of the second quarter courtesy of Ron Magat basket and a three by Akad.
A 13-0 blast by Asay, Alcasabas and Smith pulled the Stars to a nine-point lead at 60-51 from 51-47 before Francis Magat’s Vipers starring Ubalde, Ryan Aguam and David regrouped to make it 70-63 at the close of the third period.
For a while it looked like the Stars were in control of the game after securing an 80-76 lead at the five-minute mark of the fourth quarter, as they fought Stars in vicious exchanges that had the crowd roaring especially when Akad hit back-to-back threes that gave the lead back to Vipers 75-74 from 74-69.
Paolo Malonzo converted his three-pointer to spark an 11-2 Stars rally that ended when Alcasabas spun around Akad on the left side and hit a pullup jumper that eased the pressure off his team 87-82 with 28 ticks left.
On the next trip, David found Akad open on the left side for a three 87-85. Malonzo was then fouled by Ubalde and made the free throws with 13 seconds left before Ubalde kept the Vipers’ hopes alive by converting a pass from David at the top of the key, time down to 3.5 seconds.
Trying to stop the clock, Aguam fouled Malonzo with 7 tenths of a second left. Malonzo made his first free-throw but missed the second. Smith rebounded Malonzo’s miss but his shot failed to beat the buzzer and was nullified setting the final score.