Story by reader Ian Chew and photos by Ng Cheng Cong
Singapore Basketball Centre, Friday, 16 May – National U18 player Lim Shengyu (#13) may have top scored for his Hwa Chong Institution (HCI) team with 23 points, but it was their collective defense that shut down fellow semi finalist Victoria Junior College’s offense. HCI simply outscored, out-rebounded and outfought the VJ boys for a 76-53 win. The win catapulted the defending champions into a repeat A Division boys final of 2006 against Anderson Junior College, who also won their semi final game against Temasek Junior College.
Hwa Chong Institution showed their intent early by jumping to a 6-0 lead, with Shengyu scoring all 6 points. VJ’s point guard Loh Wanxin (#14) also showed some good shooting touches from beyond the arc, but the first quarter belonged to HCI. They took a 17-7 lead into the break.
HCI displayed their strength in depth when their players came off the bench to lead the team to a 37-19 first-half score. Both Shengyu and Chiam Hong Yao (#5), HCI’s point guard, scored 6 points apiece during this period to lead their team.
The fast tiring VJ team could only manage 10 points in the third quarter, The aggressive HCI defense restricted the VJ players to long distance attempts from beyond the 3-point line, but unfortunately for them, most of their shots fell far short. Hwa Chong had by this time wrapped up the game with 55-29 third quarter lead.
A controversial technical foul called on Hong Yao in the fourth quarter failed to derail the team however, and Hwa Chong went on to book a place in the final on 22 May (Thu) at the Toa Payoh Sports Hall.
Hwa Chong’s point guard Chiam Hong Yao attributed his team’s win to meticulous preparation.
Said Hong Yao: “We watched videos of the VJ team before the match and focused on shutting down their point guard (Wanxin). I think we did a pretty good job and the team (VJC) missed a lot of their attempts.”
As to the final, Hong Yao was confident but wary of the threat posed by Anderson Junior College at the same time. AJC beat Temasek Junior College 72-60 in the other semi final.
“This is the first time we are playing Anderson in the competition and we have to especially watch out for Yan Ming (#6), AJ’s key player,” he continued. Yan Ming top scored with 24 points for his team in the semi final game, including four 3-pointers.
But HCI will be facing a slight complication in their preparations for the final though. Two of their key players Lim Shengyu and Calvin Chia will be flying to Shanghai for an adidas Nations Camp from 18-24 May.
But Calvin was unflustered by the disruption.
“The trip may deprive us the chance of training with the team for the final, but I am confident our preparations over the past year have been adequate. I don’t think missing a few days of training will make much of a difference. Anyway, the camp is a chance in a lifetime!” he said.
The two boys will be flying back to Singapore from Shanghai for the match on 21 May (Wed) before flying back to Shanghai on 22 May (Thu) evening after the final. Looks like the boys will be in for an eventful week!
as zhihao said, the ball is round, anything can happen.. things did not go what we had actually wanted to.. and tj didn’t lose to aj becos we were not good enough.. both teams are good and wanna win.. but the semis haf shown that aj was stronger and won.. that’s good enough for them to have qualified for the finals spot.. yan ming is a major part of aj’s team and so are his team mates.. they’ve shown that they are capable of stepping up their games and win games.. the finals on thurs will be one match that true a’ div ballers will be looking foward to when this year’s top 2 teams play..
HAHAHAHA!!!
ZHI HAO! You know after the match we were wondering why you and wei xiong were smiling at each other most of the time. You two made us so nervous. Like, “Why are the two of them smiling??! Must be some secret plan!!” LOL! Anyway it was a really good game la. I enjoyed every single bit of it. Jia You for the final match!
go AJ! go yanming!
all the best for the upcoming games (: the game is gonna be nice ((: so will the tuesday game 😀
haha yeah yeah~ anything can happen!!
GOGO!!
All the Best for both teams ya?
heehee.. perform ur best and we will be rooting for u all! xD
ajc had a good game against us on friday. i bet everyone on the court enjoyed the game. Even me and wei xiong were smiling to each other after yan ming scored. his shooting is amusing on that day. yan ming is good so are his team mates. the fact that some people think that they dont deserve a place in the finals because almost every time, the teams that made it to the finals holds an unbeaten record and that the situation is different now.
Guys, the ball is round! Anything can happen on the court. Maybe that’s the reason why NBA playoffs are best of seven series because you cant expect players to perform for every game!
Looking forward to the finals! GO friends!
Losing two games doesn’t make ajc any less unworthy. Think about the sacrifices the players made and the effort they put in. It isn’t fair to judge the team because of two losses.
Can’t wait for thursday’s match though.
Go HCI, go AJ 😀
it’s the PASSION for the sport and game.
GO AJ BBALLERS! (:
Hello. To all, we may be lousy, we may have been lucky and we may be unworthy, but after all these years of playing basketball, one thing i know is that anything can happen on the court. That’s what makes basketball interesting la. If one team is gonna win forever, i think NBA will lose money like hell. LOL.
Let’s just do our best and enjoy the game shall we? At the end of the day, we’re all still students playing for the love of the game. That’s all. Haha.
“somebody ” tell me who deserve the final spot than? tell me. im waiting for your answer.
OMG I can’t go down on 22 May to watch ):
I’m sure it’s going to be an ultra exciting game.
May the best team win. (Go AJC though :b)
Btw, Yanming was damn zai on Friday. But there’re other players HCI should look out for too.
“The Big Assist”, wads dere to b jealous abt??cos dey are in de finals bcos of some gd luck?i realli hv nth against ajc n i admit dey are quite good…juz that their performances in certain matches had me feelin that dey din deserve their finals spot…for now im onli lookin forward to watchin a great finals!!=)
i love my team!!!!! go ajc
To Xiao Nan, isn’t yanming not playing and resting players excuses for losing to NJ and NY? If the team is so good, does lack of one player really matter? Look at hci as an example. Losing is just losing, no need excuses.
But still, both aj and hci are good teams. Good luck, may the best team win. 🙂
hey ‘anybody’ n ‘somebody’, i think you’re juz being pure jealous.
come on “anybody”, look at what i have said on behalf of the aj team. i said, WE HAVE NO EXCUSE FOR LOSING BOTH MATCHES AGAINST NJ AND NY. but i believe whoever that went for our matches had seen that we fought hard enough through 2nd round and semi finals to earn a place in the finals. we won the match with our hardworks and prides. dont hate aj basketball team, love it!
i tink aj are jus finding excuses for the losses against nj and ny. maybe u shld start thinking of wad to say after the game against hci.
hci #5 (in pic with vj #14 wanxin) is chiam hongyao.
go hwachong! (:
AJC IS GREAT!! JIAYOU AJ TEAM!
To “somebody”, c’mon, show some love~
Losing doesn’t mean much as long as you’re able to bounce back from it and perform better the next time, isn’t it? Go around asking every single A div player and you won’t find a single person who hasn’t lost a game.
Lebron lost games, Jordan lost games, but they’re still worthy, so very worthy to lead their teams in the NBA.
How’re you supposed to learn if you don’t make mistakes?
Hahahaha.
Basketball is like life.
Beautiful game.