Montserrat basketball team emerged from the bottom last year to be the 2014 Leeward Islands basketball champions after they had one hour earlier than the aborted final, beaten last year’s champs British Virgin Islands (BVI) 85 – 75.
The championship emergence came when an evenly hard fought repeat match-up between Antigua and St. Kitts, could not endure beyond the fourth minute into the second quarter. One St. Kitts official said after the teams departed the playing area: “…tempers flared and that was it and the rest is history.”
He explained and described the circumstances just as we saw it and knew it. “It’s unfortunate that the game turned out like this. These two teams have a serious rivalry for years. At the end of the day for the fans sake really, unfortunately we feel the game got out of control – maybe the referees could have called a little more the packing etc. and nip in the bud…,” he said.
A scuffle ensued just opposite the Antigua bench, as seen in one of the photos, the players landed in the bench, the St. Kitts players followed in and that was the end of the game, as one of the match officials told me, “The game is called off as the players were ejected.”
He explained: “Once the team clears the bench that is automatic ejection. The players from Antigua and St. Kitts left their bench, and once they do that you don’t have teams to play. So automatically and also for security reasons you can’t continue.”
The match ended, the packed crowd waited as there were many speculations among them as well as the LIBA officials. LIBA President Daniel Mathew president who is also president of the Antigua and Barbuda Association, said: “It’s unfortunate the game ended. Clearly, they are two very tough teams, playing very tough basketball, the rivalry goes back many years – it got reignited two nights ago in the qualifications rounds – just got out of control tonight.” He then offered, ”…We are discussing it now to see what can be the best outcome, that suits everyone.”
Members of his board met and other consultations took place, but the first reported outcome was that the two teams would share the championship. That was met with the deserved treatment, as the crowd expressed their consternation. After another few minutes, this well over an hour later since the final decision, Montserrat was declared the champions, with both Antigua and St. Kitts ‘disqualified’ leaving last year’s champions BVI runner-up and Anguilla in third place.
This was perhaps a great ending for the Montserrat team, but an unfortunate outcome for a very well-run and hosted tournament, in a new complex that one could see was new, with the incompletions hardly noticed. That brought shouts of concurrence when floor announcer Basil Chambers asked if next year’s tournament should be hosted in Montserrat.
Seven teams participated. Antigua, Anguilla, Barbuda, BVI, Montserrat, Nevis and St. Kitts in the tournament which was hosted in the newly (unfinished) sports complex housing a basketball stadium. The tournament saw full capacity crowds especially when Montserrat played and during the finals.
Acting Premier, Minister of Agriculture, Trade, Lands, Housing and the Environment, had remarked after the ejections, as he too waited for the outcome that he will have to change his speech. “My speech will be different now. I had nice things to say about St. Kitts and Antigua.” He earlier expressed his disappointment in the way the game ended. “They violated the whole tenor of the game, I don’t think it can continue,” he said.
The biggest disappointment of the night fell on about 120 persons who travelled from Antigua by Ferry to see the clash between Antigua and St. Kitts. Some were just in time to see the sad event of occurences. Naturally there were some long faces. Before the final announcement of the game, both teams assembled on mid court and hugged one another. The DJ for that evening must be compliment for playing Bob Marley’s “One Love’ shortly after the fight and before the officials gathered to consider.
A brief presentation was held – Montserrat received the trophy and players medals, along with a few other individual prizes. Vance Tuitt, one of two overseas (UK) Montserrat players received a prize for most baskets and rebounds, while the Montserrat team took honours for scoring the highest score in a match.
Visit our Facebook page to see champioship pics: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10152594875240852.1073741989.203080105851&type=1
