| Offensively Slumming |
Feb 8, 2007 |
Based on the youth, style of game, and rosters, I would have expected this game to be a high scoring affair. But, then again, looking at their 1st meeting of the season, the first game for both teams, I can see why this was so low scoring. In the 1st week of the season, these teams fought a tight game with Ash-Shams winning 34-31. Despite that first game score, both teams still managed to average 51ppg. So either these teams must be well matched, or both teams just bring out the worst in each other.
It seems this game brought out the worst. Each team only managed to have 3 players register a point on the scoresheet by halftime. Quraysh couldn't stop hacking Ahsan Raza while Ash-Shams couldn't stop hacking at Shuaib. The half-time score was only 21-15 for Ash-Shams with Ahsan dropping 13 points (7-7 FTs) and 5 rebounds while Shuaib led his team with 8 points on 6-9 from behind the charity stripe.
The 2nd half seemed to show both teams learning from their mistakes at least from a fouling point of view. Both teams pretty much eliminated Ahsan and Shuaib getting any more freebie points, while Suleiman started to finally contribute offensively like he has shown over the last few games. Despite this, Quraysh was forced to call a timeout at the 7:32 mark down 29-19. They started pulling things together and forced Ash-Shams to call a timeout at the 13:17 mark up only 31-28. Ash-Shams offense had definitely dried up. With 1:30 to go Quraysh called a timeout down only 34-31 to regroup and make one final push. In the end however, Ash-Shams held onto the 40-33 victory and will move on to face Duha. Ash-Shams was lead by Ahsan with 21pts and 7 rebs while both Shuaib and Suleiman posted 13 pts each for the losing side. |
