The 2017 Accra Basketball League (ABL) season has not been particularly kind to Ghana Navy in both Men and Women Divisions respectively. While the male side recently completed the first round without scoring a win and sitting bottom of the standings, the female side’s strong start has diffused into thin air.
Despite bolstering its roster for the season, Navy’s title challenge is all but over after falling to a second straight loss in the female division. The team lost 51-53 to Fire Service jus a day shy of a week since its 19-28 loss to league leaders Tudu Galaxy.
The curious case of Navy this season has been the entourage’s propensity to blow leads. After recovering well from a 2-7 deficit to end the first quarter leading 10-8, Navy froze in the remaining quarters to fall to Galaxy.
Against Fire, the team led through all quarters preceding the fourth quarter but managed to squander the leads in the losing matchup.
In the men’s division, Navy has repeated the strange trait especially in the game against fellow strugglers DC Dynamics on April 21 where Navy blew apart Dynamics with a 26-6 first quarter lead.
However and to the shock of fans gathered at the Lebanon House Court, Dynamics eked out a 62-61 win for its first win of the season.
At the heart of the problem is an array of shortcomings that fall under poor decision making when shooting the ball, costly turnovers and complacency when leading are the main factors.
For starters, Navy’s female side failed to score a point through the entire second quarter and a little over the half mark in the third quarter before Veteran Guard Kusi’s deep three point shot with four minutes left to play broke the cold spell.
Turnovers hurt the male side against DC as Dynamics capitalized on easy giveaways to breathe life into its campaign.
As a result, Navy has fallen further off the pace in the title race in the women’s division and is in serious danger of getting relegated to the Division II in the men’s division with only six games in the second round to play.
The ladies team has just a game remaining in the season while games in the second round in the male division begins May 19.
By Yaw Adjei-Mintah
@YawMintYM on Twitter
