Basketball Ireland must come up with a way of helping clubs with more than one team in a final

CORK basketball clubs, their players, management and officials will this week be putting all their focus on the National Cup finals that are  due to be hosted next weekend at the National Basketball Arena in Tallaght, Dublin.

Social media was awash last week with comments about the pricing of tickets for the cup finals with Brunell Basketball Club certainly aggrieved with the total cost of entry to their games.

Having three teams at the finals was always going to be a huge cost for the northside club, but when you are being charged €25 per session for your U18 and U20 finals, and then €30 for the Paudie O' Connor senior women's decider, it does test the families of the players at the club.

Naturally, with the cost of transporting teams and hotel costs, Brunell were not prepared to travel on Friday, which would have meant two overnight stays in the capital, but wouldn’t it have been wise of Basketball Ireland to give the club a weekend ticket that would have helped them big time in their hour of need?

Maybe even 200 tickets at €50 for all three games.  Surely, that could have been done and it is something Basketball Ireland need to look at for next year if another club reaches more than one final.

UCC Demons coaching crew must be wondering how their team managed to lose a 26-point lead against Tralee Warriors before going down 90-86 in their Super League clash.

Demons were unstoppable in the opening quarter as the Warriors looked dead ducks in the water but after that, the slide continued for the Leesiders as the lead was reduced to 14 at the break after leading by 32-11 after the first.

The second half made X-rated reading for the Demons faithful as they consistently missed shots coupled with careless turnovers. 

No doubt Demons' cup final opponents Ballincollig will note that when Tralee threw up a zone defence they simply lost the plot.

Now this is not a problem that has just begun with Demons as last year's Super League playoff semi-final defeat was down this problem and almost nine months later it still hasn’t been fixed.

Looking at Demons it’s all about ball screens that usually occurs when you are facing a man-to-man defence.

Playing Seventh Woods on the point is a disaster as when the pressure comes on him he is out of play and this Demons team hasn’t an idea how to feed Tillman at the post when their opponents put up a zone.

At a guess, Ballincollig will play zone against Demons in the final and it will interesting what will have changed from the Tralee loss as a repeat display will see them blown out in the capital.

Ballincollig were also in Kerry but better news for them as they saw off a resilient Killorglin side 90-87.

Killorglin will rue missing a lay-up with seven seconds remaining but credit to Ballincollig they weathered the storm despite having no Nikola Rosa in their team.

The Ballincollig American Shawndale Jones finished with a game-high 34 points and with Andre Nation and Adrian O’Sullivan chipping in with 19 each they will travel to Dublin confident they can win their first National Cup at the top tier.

The Address UCC Glanmire travelled to Waterford Wildcats and despite giving new signing American Cheah Real Whitsitt her debut they went down 81-72.

It has been a disastrous season for Glanmire but questions has to be asked of their second American Amaya West who could only manage a paltry 11 points in 36 minutes of action.

Women’s Super League leaders Gurranabraher Credit Union Brunell continued with a hard-earned win over Trinity Meteors that will give them good confidence ahead of their Paudie O’Connor National Cup final against fellow Cork side Catalyst Fr Mathew’s.

Fr Mathew’s had no game at the weekend as their final clash in Dublin against Brunell will be an opportunity for both clubs to break their hoodoo for silverware at this level.