Mysuru, Jan 14:
Defending champions Uttarakhand, Services and Telangana moved into the semi-finals of the 66th Senior National Basketball Championship here today.
Uttarakhand registered an 84-64 victory over Indian Railways in a quarter-final encounter that was marred by unsporting behaviour.
An unfortunate incident led to the ejection of Railways centre-forward Palpreet Singh for unsportsmanlike conduct.
The game turned on its head after Railways lost their centre and Uttarakhand’s Vishesh Bhrighuvanshi had a game-high 26 points in the victory and his teammate Trideep Rai contributed 22 points.
Services outplayed hosts Karnataka in another last-eight encounter, while dark horses Telangana picked up an easy win against a young Tamil Nadu team, despite some of the key players playing limited minutes due to injuries during the game.
In the women’s quarter-finals draw, Delhi turned the tables on defending champions Chhattisgarh to book their final-four berth.
Chhattisgarh’s Poonam Chaturvedi, 2015 MVP, put up 44 points shooting 83% from the field. But her rebounding numbers were down, as all five Delhi players crashed the boards, making life difficult for Poonam. The rest of Chhattisgarh’s team provided little support to Poonam.
Pratima Singh, who scored 36 points and had 7n assists, carried Delhi’s scoring load. Her sister Prashanti Singh put up 24 points and veteran shooter Raspreet Sidhu contributed timely buckets with 12 points in the contest. Delhi pulled away late to close out the game with a 84-76 victory.
Punjab women bounced back from their below par group stage performance with a 84-66 victory against Rajasthan in the pre-quarterfinals. Punjab will face Kerala women in their quarterfinal later today.
In another last-16 encounter, West Bengal registered an emphatic victory against Maharashtra, continuing their impressive run in the tournament. West Bengal’s big three of Madhu Kumari, Anjana Dezy and Libina all scored above 20 points to lead their side to a blowout 82-50 victory.
The men’s pre-quarterfinals saw Gujarat comfortably beat Haryana 88-69. Gujarat centre-forward Dishant Shah was on fire scoring 30 points in the game. Gujarat established an early lead, which they maintained for the rest of the contest to secure a place in the quarterfinal, to be played against Tamil Nadu.
The other men’s pre-quarterfinal between Kerala and Chhattisgarh was a tighter affair with the team from down south finally emerging victorious. (PTI)
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