2014/15 Game Report
Team
Opposition
Home/Away
Competition
Date
Score
Newcastle Eagles Under 18 Women
Team Birmingham
H
EBL Under 18 Women North
15th November 2014
Newcastle Eagles
62
- 63
Team Birmingham
Report
This was a mixed game for the Eagles. They played well for almost all of the forty minutes, but a third quarter
shooting spree from Birmingham’s number 13, combined with foul trouble and some patches of careless play from
the Eagles, meant that Birmingham scraped to a narrow victory in the closing seconds of the game. There were some
strong positive features to the Eagles play in this match-up, but the team will be disappointed not to have closed this
one out.
The Eagles won the tip and dominated for much of the first — though they didn’t capitalize as much as they might on
their control of the run of play in this period. Sophie Ridley had a great quarter, showing great grit and
determination. She opened with a confident runner, weaving through the Birmingham defence for two. She followed
this up with a strong move inside, pulling down her own missed shot to go up hard through a foul for an and-one.
Towards the end of the quarter she made another bold drive through the B’ham D, faking and crossing over for
another sweet two. Other quarter highlights included an impressive reverse layup in very heavy traffic from Beth
Rumble, and a nice baseline move for two from Sally Mills. The quarter ended with the Eagles up 20 to 13.
The second saw Birmingham rally a little, especially after they sank a 3 in the third minute, but the Eagles kept things
under control and for the most part traded baskets with TB. Quarter highlights included a neat runner from Bethany
Rumble, from a nice feed by Lucy Phillips, and a swished mid-range deuce from Lauren Mumford from a dish out by
Bethany Wilson. Beth W made another great assist late in the period, firing a powerful bullet pass from freethrow to
baseline to give Beth Rumble an easy layup under the basket. The score stood at 34/29 at half time.
Birmingham came out strong in the third. They sank a morale-boosting three-pointer in the fourth minute, and their
number 13 simply had a storming quarter, putting the ball on the floor and making some neat moves to rack up 18 of
B’ham’s 21 points in the period. The Eagles played pretty well in these minutes, making some good moves. Bethany
Rumble made an easy lay-up from a great pass from Lucy Phillips, then returned the compliment for Lucy a few
seconds later. Lucy made a superb end-to-end solo play from her own steal for 2. Sophie Ridley made another agile
drive through traffic for two more. But the Eagles just couldn’t match Team Birmingham for energy in this period,
and they saw their lead whittled away until TB went in front in the eighth minute. The quarter ended with the scores
at 47/50 to B’ham.
The Eagles fought back hard in the fourth. The whole team committed for pretty much the whole of the quarter,
playing with energy and intensity and making a lot of decent shooting opportunities. Despite Birmingham sinking a
three early on in the period for the third quarter in a row, the Eagles pulled back and had the lead for much of the
ten minutes of play. At the start of the final minute the Eagles sank a deuce to go up 62 to 61. Sadly foul trouble and
some careless infringements gave B’ham two sets of free throws, seeing them first even up, then pull to a gamewinning one-point lead in the final seconds of play.
Newcastle can take pride in some aspects of this game. They took the play to Birmingham and pretty much
consistently made trouble for the TB defence by getting in the paint; making inside passes much more than they
have in the past and just not settling for outside shots (Eagles had 13% low-percentage shots in this game compared
to a more usual figure around 30%). There were some nice team moves with sharp, unselfish passing giving players
really good looks. And there were some great, ‘highlight-reel’ individual plays which had Eagles fans whooping and
cheering. But Newcastle lost out in this game because of lack of consistency and some undisciplined play leading to
foul trouble. Control that, and maintain the assertive and organized offensive play they showed in this game, and the
Eagles will be a team to be reckoned with.
Top scorers for the Eagles were Bethany Rumble with 15, Bethany Wilson with 10 and Sophie Ridley with 9. It’s
worth noting that the Newcastle bench made a big contribution to the points total in this game, showing the Eagles
really do have strength in depth in shooting now. Lucy Phillips and Bethany Wilson were joint top on assists with 3 a
piece. Bethany Wilson was top on offensive rebounds with 6. Bethany Rumble was top on defensive boards, pulling
down 6. Sally Mills and Lucy Phillips shared the top steals slot with 3 each.
*** *** ***