Al Rayyan’s Lamont Jones (right) tries to go past Al Arabi’s Faraj Mohamed during their Emir Cup basketball match at the Al Gharafa Sports Club yesterday. PICTURE: Othman Iraqi
By Sports Reporter/Doha
With five minutes to go, Al Rayyan held an eight-point lead at 83-75 over Al Arabi in their Emir Cup basketball match at Al Gharafa Sports Club yesterday.
By the end of it all, Arabi had managed to give Rayyan a mighty scare scoring 17 points to Rayyan’s 10. Result? Rayyan managed a hairline-thin one-point 93-92 win.
Lamont Jones top-scored for Rayyan with 24 points, that included five three-pointers and four two-pointers, besides five rebounds and two assists.
Contributions from Yasseen Musa (21), Jermareo Davidson (18) and Boney Watson (17) ensured Rayyan held a healthy lead over their opponents throughout the match except in the last five minutes.
Arabi’s Adnad Hodzic was the top-scorer of the match with 25 points, that included 10 two-pointers and five free-throws.
Mansour Bhadary (21), William Byrd (20) and Eric Cristobal (17) were the others who got into the double digits for Arabi.
The second match between Al Gharafa and Al Ahli went down to the wire as well with overtime deciding the winner — Gharafa.
Gharafa held a one-point lead after the first period at 17-16 before Ahli went into half-time with a three-point advantage at 40-37.
The third period saw frantic scoring from both sides with Gharafa holding a six-point lead at 51-45 halfway through the period. Ahli players wrestled the period scoring 14 points in the next five minutes to go into the final period with a two-point advantage.
After oscillating between the two teams, the match nestled at 74-all at the end of regulation time.
Gharafa scored 12 in overtime while Ahli could only dunk half as much to hand the match away.
Gharafa’s Larry Blair was the star of the match with 28 points. Others who got into double digits for the winners were Omar Salam (17), Emmanuel Adako (16), Eugene Spates (14) and Samuel Monroe Jr. (11).
For Ahli, Ndyae Hassino top-scored with 24 points. Moto Vitti and Omar Mohamed pitched in with 18 and 17 points respectively. Alvin Mofunanya added 14.
Today, El Jaish will face Al Wakrah, while Al Sadd will take on Al Khor.
