Basketball: Bulls Maroon wrestle to top

Bulls Maroon are sitting alone on the top of the ladder as the only undefeated team in the Bunbury Basketball Association’s A-Grade competition, after downing arch rivals Tornadoes Red 86-69 in a physical grand final rematch on Friday night.

The referees blew an incredible 50 fouls for the game, in which all eight of Maroon’s players recorded at least three fouls.

Trent Worthington once again top scored for Bulls with 21 points, while Matt Upton provided good support with 16 points.

Tornadoes shared the scoring load evenly, with Brad Waldock, Jay Jamieson andTimCollins all recording 14 points for the match.

Aces White accounted for Bulls Gold with a 108-77 smashing, with player coach Aaron Edwards top scoring for his side with 17, along with five other players reaching double figures.

Michael Gliddon tried hard for Gold with 42 points, but it wasn’t enough as the physical pressure of Edwards, "7-foot" Sam Sopolinski and young guns Anton Fimmano and Mitch Bradbury were too strong for his side to handle.

Aces Navy defeated the improving Tornadoes Grey by a nine-point margin, with Tim Davis and Tim Dunlop scoring 16 and 15 points respectively, while Tornadoes Black cruised to an easy victory over Slammers thanks to 27 points from Tyler Hickert and 25 points for Jason Smith.

In the women’sgames, 21 points from Shannon McRobert weren’t enough to get her Bulls Maroon side over the line, with Maroon losing to Tornadoes Black by four points.

Kirbee Nielson had 20points for the winning team, and teammate Kristy Jetta backed her upwith 11 points.

Bulls Gold and Slammers battled for their first win of the season, with Slammers leading by a two-point margin at half time and then dominating the entire second half to winby 31 points.

Ellie Deighton scored 14 points for Slammers and was backed up by Dena English, while Abbie Fletcher managed 10 points for the Gold side.

In the final game of the round, Aces Blue defeated Tornadoes Red by 39 points, with Nardia Klem scoring 15 of the losing team’s 29 points.

Kristy Larsen and India Ashbolt led the Blue side with 14 and 13 points respectively.