Temasek Polytechnic outlast Singapore Polytechnic in IVP basketball overtime thriller

Story by REDintern Koh Yizhe

Nanyang Technological University, Tuesday, January 13, 2009 – In a heart-stopping encounter at the Institute-Varsity-Polytechnic (IVP) Basketball Championship, Singapore Polytechnic fought back from an early deficit to take the lead late in the match, but with 0.7 seconds remaining, Temasek Polytechnic drew level to send the match into overtime.

With momentum on their side, they limited SP to just four points to wrap up the match 85-73. With the win, TP improve to a 3-wins-0-losses record while SP fell to 1-2.

TP, the defending champions, took the game to SP early on with as they took a huge 13-point lead by the end of the first quarter.

This continued in the second quarter when TP simply ran all over SP. With their larger size, rebounds came easily for TP while their counterparts struggled to cope with them.

SP were the unhappier side going into the break trailing 24-44.

However, after an intense team talk by the SP coach and some shooting practice, SP came back into the game.

After some accurate shooting, SP hauled themselves back into the game and by the fourth quarter, a serious fight back was evident.

With seven minutes remaining, the 20-point TP lead became just two points, and thanks to a three-point play by their #11, SP took the lead with six minutes left.

Both team traded points after that, with SP just a whisker ahead.

With the clock ticking down, SP lost possession and failed to mark the wide open #10 who made an easy layup to level the match at 69-69 with 0.7 seconds remaining.

There was no looking back for defending champions TP after that, as they ran riot in the final five minutes, scoring 16 points while limiting their opponents to just four.