Lebanese Basketball Championship - Men Division One - Regular Season 2005/06

Starters:      Lamine Diawara - Elie Mechantaf - Bassem Balaa - Fady Khatib - Kenny Satterfield
Substitutes:   Paul Khoury - Rodrigue Nacouzi - Joe Ghattas -
                    Maurice Abou Kanaan - George Chibani

Looking to redeem themselves for last week’s lackluster display, Sagesse club put on show a stunning offensive performance only to be blemished by evident defensive flaws, when the vice-champions overpowered their hosts Champville as part of the league’s second matchday games.

In the first quarter, defence tormentor Fadi El-Khatib ran amok in Champville’s lines as he tested Ghassan Sarkis’ squad from all distances thus handing his team a promising 8-21 lead. The latter’s crafty coaching instinct inspired Champville’s switch to zone defence and Sagesse’s initially well-oiled offensive machine suddenly struggled for rhythm allowing ‘Les Maristes’ to end the quarter within a whisker from their visitors 20-22.

The Greens’ woes proved short-lived as they employed all measures to split Champville’s defensive scheme. Fast-breaks, perimeter shots, incessant weak-side prompting and an astute inside-outside relation were brilliantly brought to execution by Sagesse enabling them to establish a 14-point lead halfway through the second quarter. Elie Mechantaf was instrumental in orchestrating the probing passes that devastated the hosts’ lines. Champville huffed and puffed but made little headway against Sagesse’s free-scoring mechanism and a Kenny Satterfield three-pointer at the half-time buzzer built a fairly rewarding 44-57 lead.

Sagesse’s silky point-guard turned on the style in the third quarter and notched three back-to-back shots from behind-the-arc. Coach Scott Fields’ instructions of swift defensive switches early in that period paid dividends and Champville found no other way but downfall under Satterfield’s blitz. The gap reached its climax at 21 points, a mountain to climb for Ghassan Sarkis and his lads. Then, out-of-sorts Bassem Balaa gave way for Maurice Kanaan and the player nicknamed ‘Zip’ thrilled the fans with a couple of well-executed moves contributing to his side’s 69-85 advantage.

The fourth quarter was by no means plain sailing for Sagesse since persevering Champville returned within alarming distance although never leapfrogged them. The Greens’ relatively slender 7-point gap and Lorenzo Hall’s constant incursions inside Sagesse’s paint meant that the hosts were back into the thick of things, stimulating Fields’ to necessitate a time-out. At that point, Satterfield and Khatib stepped up a couple of gears and effectively put an end to Champville’s ambitions, thus wrapping up a thrilling encounter with a 102-115 scoreline… a scoreline that would unquestionably be a theme of thoughtful debriefing by Sagesse’s technical staff.

-Game statistics chart courtesy of Al-Balad newspaper - Sports Section ©-Al-Balad-2005 - All Rights reserved: