By Dean “The Sportsman” Greenaway
Legs retained their 40+ Basketball League title
Jason Edwin had 16 points in leading Legs to a 47-41 victory over East, to successfully repeat as 40+ Basketball League champions. Steve Parillon followed up with 15 and Trevon “Reese” Lewis dropped in eight and Kennedy Bass added six.
Clint Weston was East’s leading scorer with 15 points. Benson Thomas scored six off his 11 points off 3-pointers to pull East within 42-41 with under a minute left in the game. Legs won the opening game, 51-49.
“We had to claw back in the second half to become victorious. East as always, pushed us to the brink of things and we had to fight to get the win and get to the championship,” Edwin told Island Sun Sports. “It brought back good memories going against the East. Hopefully next year, we can come back again for the 3-peat.”
Edwin said Thomas made some good shots towards the end of the game, but they knew once they controlled the ball, and didn’t turn it over they’d be victorious. “Our goal was to beat East and defend the title,” he said. “We weren’t worried about the Virgin Gorda Mystics. We know they’re an old rivalry too, but they had to go through East and we had to play the winner and it was East in this situation. We knew that we had to buckle down and do things like we did in the old days.”
Repeating Edwin said, shows that they still have something in the tank. “Hopefully, next year, we’ll go for the 3-peat,” he said. “Playing in this league shows longevity. You look around and you see the guys who really love this game. They have been here from Biddy up to the 40+ and 50+, league and you can see the camaraderie. Hopefully, they’ll keep it, keep the friendship and the competitiveness going.”
“Weston said his team fell short. “We made some mistakes and weren’t playing together towards the end and we lost,” he said. “We’ll learn from this, set our team better, get more players and we’re set. This is my first year in the league and it’s good so far. I like that we can come together and still play ball.”
