In this week’s ON THE BALL, NATION basketball writer Justin Marville continues his weekly review of the Premier League.
In a year?when Barbados will participate in regional competition it is widely expected that young, uncapped players will use the domestic season to showcase their skills every chance they get.
But far from passing up a call-up to national trials, Mark Bridgeman hasn’t been passing up shot attempts either. Doubt me? Well, Saturday was just Exhibit “B” of his latest tour de force that has seen the Lakers’ reserve forward try to single-handedly take over games.
Of course, as luck would have it, the Husbands men benefited from his overzealousness as they needed every one of his ten fourth-quarter points (and 24 in total) to hold off the rival Cavs down the stretch of a close contest.
However, if those rushed pull-up jumpers and forays to the hole don’t score then they’re just bad shots, especially if ole Marky Mark is ignoring wide open shooters (good ones at that) to take these ill-advised shot attempts.
Don’t get me wrong, though, I’m a huge fan of Bridgeman’s game with his ability to finish comfortably in traffic with either hand, consistently create his own shot off the dribble and pull down offensive rebounds at a rate matched only by Junior Moore.
And much of this perceived “lousing” might be dictated by his role as the side’s best player off the bench, and the fact he is one of the few Lakers that can easily create for himself. It isn’t as if he’s reached the black hole levels of Stevenson Callender either, so this may be much ado about nothing.
But someone should still advise Bridgeman to tone it down a tad as he’s probably a shoo-in for trials, and once there his recent “shoot-first” ways will be held in even less regard than they were in this column.
Because the one shot he’ll have to pass up is the one at wearing the ultramarine and gold.
• I know their season is but two games old, and it’s never wise to doubt an Adrian Craigwell-coached side, but my deepest fears for this young Cavs squad are already being realized.
That’s two losses on the trot now for Station Hill and the theme is becoming all too familiar – these Cavaliers just can’t close out tight fourth quarters. Coincidence, you say? Maybe, or perhaps Station Hill’s collective inexperience is already starting to bear where you would expect it to.
More worrisome, though, is that there isn’t a real go-to guy no matter where you look on this roster. Call it a No.1 option, star player, franchise man or whatever, all I know is that the Cavs don’t have any one player they can go to on a consistent basis when games get tight or when they’re taken out of transition.
And that’s exactly what led to defeat down the stretch against Cougars, and especially Lakers, as Station Hill struggled to score in the latter stages of the fourth quarter without a player that can routinely win a one-on-one matchup.
Right now, they all seem to be decent to pretty good complementary players, and that might serve the team’s cohesion well as the young squad won’t have to deal with another over-inflated ego.
But complementary pieces are just that – pieces which should complement another greater part of the puzzle rather than being the centrepiece – and I believe the talents of these Cavaliers would shine brighter if they had a star player in their midst that would attract most of the attention from opposing defences.
That said, this team is still good enough to contend for a post-season berth, having already gone toe-to-toe with two of the league’s top three squads.
At least it surely doesn’t bode well for the rest of the substandard competition that poses as a Premier League.
