Even though Neptune maintain their cushion at the top of the table, there may yet be some life in the ESB Superleague title chase with Denny Notre Dame recording a double this weekend.
On their home court in the National Basketball Arena yesterday, Notre Dame came up with a crucial 80-71 win over Burger King Limerick, and following their 84-72 win over UCD Marian on Friday night, they now move into joint second for the first time this year. The hopes of closing down the leaders are still slim but at least they're alive.
It wasn't all a one-team show yesterday. Limerick were up 3735 at the half-time thanks to the high-scoring Rock Winston (27 points in total), but Notre Dame made their superiority count in the final quarter with the lead, as always, coming from Anthony Jenkins. He was one of four home players to shoot in double figures. Jenkins scored 21 points as did Brian Benjamin with 20 coming from Eric Blair.
Also keeping their grip on the runner-up spot are Star of the Sea and Esat Telecom Demons. Both had important wins on Saturday, with Star, at home, proving too strong for the struggling Tolka Rovers and were rarely challenged in their 86-76 victory. Gabe Jackson picked up an impressive 29 points for Star. However, Tolka gave the impression towards the end of the game that they were keeping a little in reserve for their big cup semi-final next weekend.
The Demons, however, had to work a little harder for the 66-52 win from their visit to Waterford Crystal. Only one point up at half time, they piled on the pressure in the third quarter and outscored Waterford 19-8. Still, this will hardly give them a major psychological boost in their ambitions to catch Neptune.
In fact, whatever psychological bonuses were available this weekend probably went to the leaders themselves. Hosting the bottom-placed Sligo Dairies, it was all over as a contest by the end of the first quarter as Neptune cruised into a 25-12 lead. Maintaining that sort of form until the finish, they eventually crushed Sligo 108-73 to keep that eight point margin at the top. No let up either in the Jon D'Orlando-Rasual McKune scoring combination as they chalked up 53 points between them.
The main losers yesterday were Kerry Spring Killarney, as their 99-80 loss to St Vincent's means they drop to joint third. The Dublin hosts were in superb form, racing to a 28-8 lead after the first quarter and Ferdinand Williams ended up top scorer on 23 points, with 15 each for Brian Tonkovich and dual GAA-player Carl Donnolly.
Meanwhile, the predictable pattern continues in the women's Superleague. Yesterday, Tolka Rovers stretched their unbeaten run to 14 games by demolishing Crusaders 78-40 while defending champions, Avonmore Snowcream Wildcats, still chase in vain with their 81-44 win over Meteors on Saturday.
At least the University of Limerick and Killester managed to create some sort of a decent tie. Killester were up 28-22 at half time with Marie Thompson leading the scoring but Limerick fought back in the third quarter to close down to three points. With seven points from frees in the last quarter, the home side were fortunate to come out 57-54 winners.
