A com­bined ef­fort from Sim­ba Ed­wards, Justin Mitchell, and Lemuel Matthews helped Point Fortin Vet­er­ans Bas­ket­ball Acad­e­my (PFVB­BA) se­cure the Men’s Un­der-23 Di­vi­sion ti­tle in the South Zone Bas­ket­ball League.

The dra­mat­ic se­ries con­clud­ed in a nail-bit­ing, win­ner-take-all game three against ri­vals South­side Elite at the South­ern Re­gion­al In­door Sports Are­na in Pleas­antville, San Fer­nan­do on Wednes­day.

​PFVB­BA over­came a se­ries deficit and a sig­nif­i­cant late-game scare to win the fi­nal con­test, 70-68, earn­ing them the U-23 crown with a 2-1 se­ries vic­to­ry.

​The fi­nal match in the best-in-three se­ries fi­nal was a true bat­tle of at­tri­tion, marked by dra­mat­ic lead changes and high-stakes scor­ing. South­side Elite, who had pre­vi­ous­ly won game one, 73-68 on Oc­to­ber 16, came out strong, edg­ing PFVB­BA in the first quar­ter, 20-19. PFVB­BA im­me­di­ate­ly re­spond­ed, fight­ing back to take a slim lead at the half, 37-36.

​How­ev­er, the third quar­ter be­longed en­tire­ly to South­side Elite, who went on a dom­i­nant run fu­elled by their key play­ers. They outscored PFVB­BA sig­nif­i­cant­ly to build a daunt­ing 12-point lead head­ing in­to the fi­nal pe­ri­od, 58-46.

PFVB­BA staged a fu­ri­ous come­back in the fourth quar­ter. Spear­head­ing the scor­ing ef­fort was Ed­wards, who fin­ished with a match-high 18 points. Cru­cial con­tri­bu­tions al­so came from Mitchell with 11 points and Matthews adding 10, as PFVB­BA steadi­ly chipped away at the deficit.

​De­spite the late surge, South­side Elite’s star play­ers kept the match com­pet­i­tive un­til the fi­nal buzzer. Ja­son Fri­day led all scor­ers in the con­test with 22 points, ably sup­port­ed by Ne­gaste Moore (19) and Jo­seiah Mar­ryshow (12). Ul­ti­mate­ly, PFVB­BA’s clutch ex­e­cu­tion in the dy­ing mo­ments al­lowed them to come away with the two-point vic­to­ry, com­plet­ing their come­back from los­ing the se­ries open­er.

​The win in game three means PFVB­BA, who al­so won the piv­otal Game 2, 73-66, takes the se­ries fi­nal 2-1, es­tab­lish­ing them as the cham­pi­ons of the South Zone Men’s U-23 Di­vi­sion.

​The South Zone Bas­ket­ball League, run by the South Zone Bas­ket­ball Com­mis­sion, led by act­ing NBFTT Pres­i­dent Clint “Cheesy” Wil­son, re­sumes in the league to­day. In the first match, Bronx take on Ris­ing Stars in the U-23 third-place play­off at 6.30 pm, then the bat­tle for the Cham­pi­onship Di­vi­sion ti­tle be­gins with Elite fac­ing Po­lice in game one at 8 pm.

Club En­ter­prise Sweeps Girls’ U-19 Di­vi­sion

​

Club En­ter­prise, play­ing with­out star play­er Mya Ray­mond, who re­cent­ly de­part­ed on a schol­ar­ship to Cana­da, se­cured a de­ci­sive vic­to­ry in the Girls’ U-19 Di­vi­sion of the South Zone Bas­ket­ball League on Oc­to­ber 19, de­feat­ing Ed­in­burgh Bas­ket­ball Acad­e­my 60-51 in game two, to sweep the se­ries fi­nal, 2-0.

Club En­ter­prise con­trolled the game from the open­ing whis­tle, re­ly­ing on a pow­er­house per­for­mance from Melis­sa Pierre to main­tain an unas­sail­able lead through­out all four quar­ters.

En­ter­prise set the tone ear­ly, util­is­ing quick tran­si­tions and ef­fec­tive shoot­ing to gain an ad­van­tage in the first quar­ter, 16-12. By half­time, they had ex­tend­ed their lead to nine points, head­ing in­to the break up 31-22.

​The mo­men­tum re­mained firm­ly with En­ter­prise in the third quar­ter. They con­tin­ued to ex­e­cute their of­fence ef­fi­cient­ly, build­ing their largest lead of the evening be­fore the fi­nal buzzer, with the score stand­ing at 46-37 in their favour.

​Club En­ter­prise’s vic­to­ry was an­chored by Pierre, who was un­stop­pable, pour­ing in a match-high 24 points. Cru­cial sup­port came from Faith Ham­let, who added 12 points, and Maka­da Prescott, con­tribut­ing 11 points to the win­ning ef­fort.

​De­spite the deficit, Ed­in­burgh fought hard un­til the end, pow­ered by strong of­fen­sive out­ings from Adrielle Joseph (15) and Kaleigh Shaw (15). Faith Car­di­nal al­so reached dou­ble-dig­its for Ed­in­burgh with 10 points.

​Ul­ti­mate­ly, En­ter­prise’s con­sis­tent lead from the start proved too much for Ed­in­burgh to over­come, se­cur­ing the nine-point win.

When the teams met pre­vi­ous­ly, Club En­ter­prise, de­spite the ab­sence of Ray­mond, de­liv­ered a strong per­for­mance to de­feat Ed­in­burgh 69-42 in game one. Pierre, Prescott and Ham­let were al­so key in that win, 27, 14 and 12, re­spec­tive­ly.

Top scor­ers for Ed­in­burgh were Shaw (17) and Car­di­nal (8).

The Girls’ U-19 third-place play­off be­tween Bronx and 500 Hawks and game two of the Cham­pi­onship Di­vi­sion fi­nal, Po­lice vs Elite, are sched­uled for Fri­day. The Com­mis­sion, though self-suf­fi­cient thus far this sea­son, is ac­tive­ly seek­ing spon­sor­ship.

Re­sults

Oc­to­ber 22

Men’s U-23 Di­vi­sion (Game 3)

PFVB­BA 70 (Sim­ba Ed­wards 18, Justin Mitchell 11, Lemuel Matthews 10) vs South­side Elite 68 (Ja­son Fri­day 22, Ne­gaste Moore 19, Jo­seiah Mar­ryshow 12). Quar­ter scores: 1st 20-19 (Elite), 2nd 37-36 (PFVB­BA), 3rd 58-46 (Elite).

Oc­to­ber 19

Women’s U-19 Di­vi­sion (Game 2)

Ed­in­burgh 51 (Adrielle Joseph 15, Kaleigh Shaw 15, Faith Carid­nal 8) vs Club En­ter­prise 60 (Melis­sa Pierre 24, Faith Ham­let 12, Make­da Prescott 11). Quar­ter scores: 1st 16-12, 2nd 31-22, 3rd 46-37 (All in favour of En­ter­prise).