Basketball Academy Limburg (BAL) won against The Hague Royals on Saturday evening in Weert. 66-61, the team from the newly naturalized Dutch coach Radenko Varagic defeated the guests from the Hofstad.
Due to both the victory and the defeat of Den Helder, BAL rises one place in the ranking. It was the last game in the first round of the competition, in which BAL finished ninth.
Lean start
The points were expensive in the first quarter. After ten minutes of clean playing time, the opening ended in 12-7. Defensively it was good at the Weerter home club, but not yet offensively. That also applied to opponent Royals.
Icelander Snorri Vignisson especially stood out. He was the most scoring player among the guests before the break with eleven points. Still, BAL led 32-28 at halftime. It didn’t work out with the ‘three-pointers’.
third quarter
The Hague might have taken the second quarter (20-21), the first part after the break was again for Weert (18-16). That made it 50-44. Partly because there were now some three-pointers, including from Donovan Mitchell.
last quarter
With Max van den Heuvel as one of the better players on the BAL side seemed to run the team away (60-51). Still, The Royals came back and it was still exciting (63-61).
Via a three-pointer from Sander Hollanders, BAL got a little more air. There was still a little more than one minute to play, but The Hague came no closer. Also because Tom Ackermans, ex-Weert player, missed.
Snorri Vignisson became top scorer with 20 points. At BAL, Donovan Mitchell was the man with the highest score with 14 points.
silver league
The Hague Royals did win the fourth quarter 16-17, but that was not enough for the win. That was for the home club, which means that BAL will start in the Elite Silver League in mid-March. In addition to the Dutch, Belgian teams will also play in this.
A report with match images and interviews of the game can be seen on L1 Television on Sunday.