EPIC RIVALRIES didn’t end with the Lakers-Cavs series.Station Hill’s dominance just might have.This wasn’t the classic thriller of the men’s final, but the women’s equivalent is proving all the more dramatic after Act II Popcorn Clapham Bulls stunned basketball’s reigning nine-time league champs Mpact Station Hill Cavaliers 57-48 in Tuesday’s Game 1 at the Wildey Gym.After two highly-publicised failures on the big stage, the underdog Bulls are now just one win away from finally dethroning the Cavs, who lost a series-opener for the first time since 2002.It was also only their second ever finals defeat in that span, following the loss to Tigers eight years ago and a Game 2 defeat to the same Bulls last season.Unlike that series-leveller, this contest was over six minutes into the second half when the Bulls scored 21 straight points in one surreal start to the third quarter.This was after the Cavs led by as many as eight (21-13) in the second quarter before holding what appeared to be a then comfortable 25-19 half-time cushion.But that advantage disappeared as fast as the champs’ swagger after Station Hill went scoreless over the next 6:21 minutes against a stifling interior defence that gave up nothing in the paint.Hardly an entry pass got into Wanda Agard-Belgrave and Astrid Alleyne, and on the errant occasion the twin towers saw the ball in the post, they were also greeted with a tent of two to three defenders.Even the overseas-based Jamila Studer, née Griffith, couldn’t get going while facing a disciplined Clapham unit intent on taking away her favoured mid-range jumper and keeping her off the offensive glass.
Thorns in Cavs’ sideAnd just as they did eight years prior, Toni Atherley and Jennifer Joseph-Hackett proved the proverbial thorns in the Cavs’ side at the other end, as the former Tigers accounted for the first six points of the 21-0 run and 13 overall in the third.It began with a pair of Hackett turnarounds, followed by Atherley’s free-throw line jumper, before Antonia Baptiste truly keyed the run with five straight points to give Bulls their first lead since the first quarter.The result of the surge was a resounding 40-25 Clapham lead, which was rudely interrupted when Studer went on her own personal 7-0 spree towards the end of the period.But the Bulls weren’t done yet, more specifically Joseph-Hackett, who also opened the fourth with a pair of jump shots as part of an ensuing 8-1 run that put Clapham up by 15 (52-37).Outside of the shocking result, Station Hill got a further scare when Studer was forced to leave the game briefly with 4:02 after hitting the back of her head.However, the professional forward returned just minutes later to give the final score-line some respectability.Atherley and Joseph-Hackett finished with 19 and 18 points respectively, while Baptiste chipped in with 11 to make up for the sub-par games of starters Shakira Shorey and Sadé Clarke. Studer led all scorers with 20, and Alleyne and Agard-Belgrave had 12 points apiece for the Cavs, who will look to square the series tonight at the same venue.
