The 2018 WBBL Play-Off Final will see the top two teams in the WBBL Championship fight it out for the precious silverware at The O2 as both Sevenoaks Suns and Leicester Riders booked their places. After taking down last year’s Final opponents Nottingham, this time around they will get to defend their cherished title against arch rivals, Riders in what looks to be a mouth-watering match-up.
Sevenoaks will defend the title they won last year on their maiden visit after they swamped Nottingham Wildcats 73-48 off the back of 23 points from Cat Carr and a classy 15 points and 12 boards from Chantelle Pressley.
After a difficult first half, Suns were simply unstoppable when they emerged from the locker room and blasted a hole in the hopes of Wildcats by racking up an eye-popping 22-5 third period to take control.
Recent winner of the Molten WBBL Coach of the Year, Len Busch, said he was feeling very excited at the prospect of returning to the O2 next weekend saying: “Like the players, I really wanted to get back to the O2, but it’s nothing that we’ve spoken about or dare verbalise. We’ve just tried to take one step at a time and focus on the game in front of us. But now that we’ve done it, I can honestly say that I’m elated for the team and to be able to go with them, it’s a great experience.”
The Suns went to the locker room at the break just one point ahead (33-32), however a different Suns came out in the second half scoring 22-5 in the third quarter. Asked about his halftime team talks, Busch said: “We talked about how they [Nottingham] were shooting really really well, I think they were shooting 55%, which is going to make life difficult for anybody, so we wanted to pick up our defence a little bit more.”
Cat Carr was MVP of the 2017 Final and will be one of the leading candidates to take that gong again after putting her side through with 23 points. Meanwhile Chantelle Pressley contributed a superb double-double of 15 points and 12 rebounds.
Top scorers for Suns were Cat Carr (23), Chantelle Pressley (15) and Judit Fritz (12).
Having won the Championship a few weeks ago, Len stated that his team are still calm and relaxed going into next weeks final, however he added that: “We do need to play with a lot of intensity so it’s a kind of double-edged sword”.
Busch added about his squad and the future of Sevenoaks Suns: “I had a few young players on the bench today, some of who I couldn’t play due to Basketball England rules, however next year they will be in the WBBL team. I did get a few young players on today though, who did well and they’re going to have a great time next week at the O2”.
The contest at the O2 will also be a repeat of the recent 2018 Betty Cordona WBBL Trophy Final which Riders won, while Suns then extracted revenge by pipping their rivals to the WBBL Championship.
