​The T&T Po­lice Ser­vice team will fight to ex­tend the Cham­pi­onship Di­vi­sion se­ries when it faces South­side Elite in game two of the best-of-three fi­nal Wednes­day night at the South­ern Re­gion­al In­door Sports Are­na in Pleas­antville, San Fer­nan­do at 8 pm.

​Elite cur­rent­ly leads the se­ries 1-0 af­ter se­cur­ing a nar­row 81-75 vic­to­ry in game one on Wednes­day.

​The se­ries’ sec­ond match, orig­i­nal­ly sched­uled for Fri­day, was post­poned due to a height­ened se­cu­ri­ty alert across T&T, sparked by re­ports of a pos­si­ble Unit­ed States at­tack on neigh­bour­ing Venezuela. The alert led to wide­spread can­cel­la­tions and af­fect­ed the abil­i­ty of pro­tec­tive ser­vices per­son­nel, in­clud­ing the Po­lice team’s play­ers, to par­tic­i­pate in the com­pe­ti­tion. Po­lice in­formed the South Zone Bas­ket­ball Com­mis­sion that “all their play­ers have been called out for of­fi­cial du­ty,” lead­ing the Com­mis­sion to ac­knowl­edge the pub­lic’s pa­tience and resched­ule the match.

In the open­ing match, ​South­side Elite, led by an out­stand­ing 29 points from Ja­son Fri­day, se­cured a hard-fought vic­to­ry over Po­lice in a close­ly con­test­ed bat­tle.

​Elite, coached by for­mer na­tion­al women’s bas­ket­baller Melis­sa Guerero, es­tab­lished an ear­ly ad­van­tage, lead­ing 17-13 af­ter the first quar­ter and main­tain­ing a five-point, 42-37 ad­van­tage go­ing in­to half­time.

How­ev­er, Po­lice, coached by Ash­ton Pe­ters, mount­ed a strong come­back in the third quar­ter, outscor­ing Elite to draw the scores lev­el at 58 apiece, set­ting up a thrilling fi­nale. Elite re­gained the mo­men­tum in the fi­nal pe­ri­od to se­cure the six-point win.

Fri­day was well sup­port­ed by Michael Phillip, who con­tributed 17, Je­lani Val­ley added 14 and Tyrik Singh scored 10 in Elite’s win.

For Po­lice, ​Fab­rice Fish­er topped with 19 points. ​Nathy­on Lewis fol­lowed with 16 points. ​Mika­hail Williams net­ted 13 and ​Jesse Hamil­ton chipped in 10.

​Game Three, if nec­es­sary, is sched­uled for Fri­day.

In the open­ing match tonight, Quar­ters and Ansa Stars will bat­tle for third place in the Cham­pi­onship Di­vi­sion from 6.30 pm.

Bronx win ​U-23 Di­vi­sion third-place play­off

​Bronx se­cured a de­ci­sive vic­to­ry over Ris­ing Stars with a score of 79-62, to take third place in the Un­der-23 Di­vi­sion. Bronx dom­i­nat­ed through­out the game, as re­flect­ed in the quar­ter scores– 21-14 in the first, 37-25 at half­time, 60-41 in the third.

​Kris­t­ian Alexan­der of Ris­ing Stars was the match’s top­scor­er with 23 points, but strong, bal­anced scor­ing from four play­ers—Isaac Ma­rine (17), Dar­i­on Sparks (11), An­ton Skeete (11), and Kern Mc­Far­lene (10)—pow­ered the Bronx win.

Re­sults

Cham­pi­onship Di­vi­sion (Game 1)

Elite 81 (Ja­son Fri­day 29, Michael Phillip 17, Je­lani Val­ley 14, Tyrik Singh 10) vs Po­lice 75 (Fab­rice Fish­er 19, Nathy­on Lewis 16, Mika­hail Williams 13, Jesse Hamil­ton 10). Quar­ters: 1st 17-13 (Elite), 2nd 42-37 (Elite), 3rd 58-58.

U-23 Di­vi­sion third place play­off

Bronx 79 (Isaac Ma­rine 17, Dar­i­on Sparks 11, An­ton Skeete 11, Kern Mc­Far­lene 10) vs Ris­ing Stars 62 (Kris­t­ian Alexan­der 23, Jiel Young 13). Quar­ters: 1st 21-14, 2nd 37-25, 3rd 60-41 (All in favour Bronx)

Wednes­day

Cham­pi­onship Di­vi­sion

Third place play­off

Quar­ters vs Ansa Stars, 6.30 pm

Fi­nal (Game 2)

Po­lice vs Elite, 8 pm