City of Birmingham Rockets Women (56) v MK Breakers Women (60)
MK Women’s hopes of a league title remained intact having secured a hard-fought but well-deserved road win at the Nechells Wellbeing Centre on Saturday afternoon against a determined, well-coached City of Birmingham Rockets team.
The much anticipated contest brought together two of the best teams in the league and a win for either team was going to be significant in terms of the league title race. Earlier in the season, the teams had gone toe-to-toe for 40 minutes in what was a fabulous game at Shenley Leisure Centre. On that occasion, MK were the victors, but only by three points. Going into Saturday’s game, MK knew that beating the Rockets on their home court would be a huge challenge and the opponents would have been aiming for at least a four point win to claim the head-to-head.
Birmingham’s sharp shooter Grace Brownell set the tone for the hosts hitting 11 of her team’s 21 points in the first quarter which included three 3-pointers. Her efforts, together with those of her influential teammate Nuri Calderon gave Birmingham a four-point lead at the end of the first quarter (21-17).
MK paid much closer attention to Brownell for the remainder of the game and held her to just six points which came in the form of two more 3-pointers in the final period. The quality of MK’s defence limited the Rockets to 12 points in the second quarter, however, they struggled to convert their own shot attempts into scores and could only manage 12 points themselves. Even though Breakers went into the mid-game break with a four point deficit (33-29), their confidence level was high.
In the third period, both teams continued to play tough defence and frustrated each other’s offence. MK found it difficult to penetrate the Rockets zone and on the flip side, Birmingham struggled to find good shot attempts due to MK’s stifling man-to-man defence. In another low-scoring quarter, Birmingham added a single point to their lead (47-42).
At half-time, MK had talked about fatigue becoming a factor and so it transpired. MK’s deep bench meant that Coach Round was able to rotate his players throughout the game whereas Birmingham’s Coach was more reliant on his starters. The Breakers were able to maintain their defensive intensity which forced several turnovers that resulted in fast-break points. In addition, 3-pointers from Lauren Dabbs, Sarah Round and debutant Georgia Elliott-King turbo-boosted MK’s scoring. By mid-way through the final period, MK had stolen the lead which they held onto to the end of the game. As time was running out, Brownell hit the last of her long-range shots which cut MK’s lead back to three points, but the need to foul with 1.5 seconds left put Courtney Gray on the free throw line. Gray needed just one point to put the game out of Birmingham’s reach and she delivered (56-60).
In what was a really important win for the Breakers, Sarah Round played a key role throughout the game. At one end of the floor she worked hard to try to lock down Brownell and at the other end of the floor she poured in 22 points which included four 3-pointers. The ever-reliable Lauren Dabbs also reached double figures with 11 points, but it’s fair to say that every member of the team made positive contributions.
Commenting after the game, Coach Round said, “It was pleasing to see how well we did as a team today and how we maintained our confidence, composure and energy for all 40 minutes. Having said that, it was only one victory and we still have a job to do. We have to earn the wins so the challenge is to keep ourselves at this level to the end of the season.”