– team manager confident that selection and preparation processes will yield success
By Kiev Chesney
Some members of the IGG male basketball team and coach Lugard Mohan (seated left) after one of their practice games last weekend at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall in Georgetown
The countdown to the 2011 Inter-Guiana Games stands at 32 days to go, and the male and female basketball teams are both in a good place, according to team manager Chris Bowman, with both teams benefiting from a combination of competition, experience and intense training.
Last weekend, the male training squad secured two impressive wins, against Plaisance Guardians and Pepsi Sonics respectively.
In the latter victory on Saturday evening, the IGG squad was able to withstand several come-from-behind attempts from Sonics, who are one of Georgetown’s top First Division clubs.
The IGG team prevailed 79-73 and showed good confidence and ball movement during the final minutes of the game, when Pepsi Sonics’ coach and defensive specialist Mark Agard instituted his fierce whole-court press. Agard’s tactics had significantly helped Guyana win the IGG male basketball title back in 2007, but the team has not stood at the top of the podium since.
Now the team is under the strict stewardship of former national captain and two-time CARICOM All Star basketball player Lugard Mohan, who is also the national assistant coach. National senior coach Robert Cadogan, who coached the male team in the last two stagings of the competition, is now the coach of the female team, and is assisted by Leona Kite.
The national junior girls played the Queen’s College’s (QC) male basketball team, which is one of the top-ranked Second Division teams in the nation. The QC Knights won the game 41-22, but the IGG girls were able to stay competitive throughout the encounter.
The IGG girls were tenacious on the defensive end, and forced many turnovers from the QC team. Another notable improvement was that the IGG girls displayed expertise in the rebounding department, led by their six-footer Ginelle Ifill.
Speaking exclusively with Guyana Times International Sport yesterday, Bowman said both teams were progressing well as they begin to approach the homestretch on the road to IGG 2011.
“We are peaking in training right now, and we are implementing a good balance of increased training with competitive games,” Bowman stated.
Bowman, who is also the president of Youth Basketball Guyana (YBG), said that the skills, conditioning and other such areas are being strengthened every day, and only some minor qualities have to be developed by the players. “It’s just left for the coaches to finalise their game plan… just a matter of letting players gel together and do what the coaches want them to do in game situations,” Bowman added.
The squad at this point is predominantly comprised of out-of-town players from areas such as Linden Kwakwani, Plaisance and Berbice. While assembling and training a team with players from those areas have posed a problem with other national teams in the past, Bowman said that careful planning and commitment from both the players and administrators have helped them to manage the situation.
Dominic Vincente is the only Georgetown player who has made it this far in the process. Bowman described this as an indication of their commitment to getting the process right and having the best possible team represent Guyana.
Richard Mohandatt, the two-time junior national who migrated earlier this year, is also expected to compete in this year’s event.
The process that Bowman emphasised included the YBG nationwide National Schools Basketball Festival (NSBF), which included Conference Regionals for the first time this year. This exposed more than 50 teams to competitive play around the country, and gave talented players from out-of-town areas a chance to prove their prowess.
The NSBF Overall Championship trophy was won by Linden Technical Institute (LTI), which also won the First Division category; while New Amsterdam Multilateral won the Second Division for an out-of-town sweep of this year’s festival.
The process also included a tour to Kwakwani, a community with such rich basketball heritage that it has five NSBF titles and a player on every junior national team since the reintroduction of IGG in 2006.
The IGG male and female teams will be engaged in several other competitive games over the next few weeks as they prepare for IGG, which be held from October 21 to 23 in Suriname.
Track and field, swimming, cycling, football, volleyball and chess are the other sporting disciplines that will be competed at the event.
