The newbies, Sommet, defeated the defending champions, the City Oilers, in game one of the semi-finals to take a 1-0 lead.

This was a very exciting and straight from the first quarter, it was evident that it would be high scoring.

The first quarter ended 25-22 with Sommet in the lead.

Franck Fataki Nyembo was causing all sorts of problems for the Oilers from shooting the 3 to going to the rim. He had 12 points with 2 of 2 from the 3-point line.

For the Oilers, they managed to get off a couple of jump shots with contributions from various parties.

It was a see-saw second quarter with the lead never exceeding 4 points. Both teams were coming at each other hard with the game being tied 6 times and the lead changing on 6 occasions.

Sommet hit some impressive triples but the most key ones were scored by Peter Cheng more so the one that gave them the lead towards the end of the quarter.

The Oilers were also doing a lot of things right on the offensive end. They moved the ball and created very good shots.

However defensively, the defensive stops weren’t as they wanted them to be.

As the quarter winded down, the game was tied at 44 apiece and it was very clear were in for an entertaining second half.

The Oilers lost the game in the third quarter.

Sommet outscored them 22-13 but it is important to note that the Oilers failed to convert from distance.

They made just 1 of 11 3-point shot attempts and this helped Sommet gain a significant lead on them.

Peter Cheng and Kasereka Tembo each made 2 threes and Sommet made a 12-0 run to put some separation between them and the Oilers.

At this point, Oilers had no idea what to do, their shots weren’t dropping while everything Sommet touched turned to Gold.

However, in the fourth quarter, they managed to cut the deficit to 4 points but the remainder of the game was the Mark Ngobi show.

He scored 12 of Sommet’s final 16 points to finish off the Oilers with an 86-74 victory.

One thing abou this game is that almost all the players of Sommet contributed significantly.  They had 5 players scoring double digits but also used an 8-man rotation.

Coach and player remarks

“We lacked a bit in defense and they also had a good day. They shot everything. If you have a good day, that is what happens” Fayed Baale on the game.

He added, “I feel the ball moved well in the first half but in the second it didn’t but we shall watch film and get better.”

Sommet’s Coach Albert Aciko on the strategy ahead of the game and the how he got different players to score.

“We agreed that we shall attack the basket as hard as we can and we can execute and we trusted each other to execute and that was tremendous especially in the fourth quarter.”

“40 minutes is a very long time. You can’t rely on only one player to finish for you. You have to have different players executing.”

He concluded with the mentality ahead of game 2.

“We’ve put game one aside. For us, it is 0-0 now. We approach game 2 like we haven’t played a game. Same intensity, going strong and we hope to win game 2 as well.”

Player Stats

Sommet

Kasereka Tembo 15 pts, 12 ast, 8 reb, 2 stl

Nyembo Fataki 18 pts, 5 reb, 2 stl

Peter Cheng 18 pts, 15 reb, 3 ast, 2 stl

Mark Ngobi 17 pts, 4 reb, 2 ast

John Focus Teko 12 pts, 7 reb, 4 ast

City Oilers

Kurt Curry Wegscheider 19 pts, 10 reb, 7 ast

Jordan Bowie Chad 13 pts, 6 ast, 3 reb

Fayed Baale 11 pts, 9 reb, 2 ast

Joseph Chuma 11 pts, 7 reb

Sommet now lead the series 1-0 and will take the advantage in game 2.

Game 2 shall take place on Friday 19^th and both teams will be coming in hard with the expectation of either taking a 2-0 lead or levelling the series.