Dave Ryan reports…
Levett Essex Leopards will look to bounce back from their loss at Leicester Warriors when they host London Lituanica at Harlow Leisurezone, on Saturday.
The action starts at 7.30pm and will see the Big Cats face a side they have already beaten 68-61 on the road in the National Trophy.
If the game is as good as the last time Steve Ogunjimi’s side were in action at Harlow, the fans are in for a treat as Solent Kestrels were beaten 96-93 in overtime.
Lituanica will arrive at Leisurezone with a 3-4 record, but have had one win deducted after they conceded their game at Manchester Magic, and sit just above the relegation zone in 12th place.
Leopards will look to end a run of three games between the clubs that has seen the visiting team take the victory.
Last season saw Leopards become the first team in Lituanica’s four-year history – during which time they moved up the NBL – to win on their east London court with an 89-68 victory but produced a lacklustre performance in the return at Brentwood with a 51-48 loss. There was also a three-point margin when the sides met at Brentwood in the Trophy last season, with the Big Cats winning 71-68.
That Trophy loss against Leopards didn’t prevent Lituanica reaching the Trophy semi-final where they will meet Worthing, but like Leopards they went out of the National Cup at the hands of second division Kent Crusaders, with their 52-point loss the biggest margin of defeat for a top flight team against lower division opposition in over 30 years.
After three straight wins with their new-look line-up, Leopards were brought back to earth on Saturday as they went down 85-71 in the midlands.
To complete a miserable day for the Big Cats, they had former GB guard Perry Lawson ejected for throwing the ball at Warriors’ Carl Pearson.
The visitors never recovered from a disappointing start as they trailed 15-6 after six minutes – Darrell Bethune having scored four of those points against his old team – and they went into the first break trailing 24-13.
That deficit grew to as many as 18 early in the second period before Mike Martin sparked a comeback to reduce the margin to 40-32 before Warriors finished the half strongly to lead 48-37 at half-time.
The visitors failed to trouble the scorers in the first six minutes of the second half as Warriors effectively wrapped the game up at 56-37 before AJ Roberts broke the drought, but Leopards trailed 62-45 at the final break and never looked likely to stage a comeback in the fourth period.
Martin led the way for the visitors with another massive double-double, finishing with 16 points and as many rebounds, while Roberts finished with 16 points. Dougie Bennett came off the bench to hit four of his seven three point attempts on the way to a 15-point game, with Bethune adding 11 points.
“We lacked intensity” admitted coach Ogunjimi. “We had it in spurts, but you can’t let a team like Leicester start well, and not following the game-plan we worked on in practice really hurt us.”
