Youth Olympic Basketball: Singapore girls go down 9-32 to Belarus

Story by Koh Yizhe/Red Sports. Photos by Thomas Tan/Red Sports

*Scape Youth Park, Tuesday, August 17, 2010 — Our Singapore basketball girls have yet to secure a win in the Youth Olympic Games (YOG) FIBA 33 competition after three matches, with their latest defeat coming against Belarus 9-32.

The quartet of Hannah Ng, Alanna Lim, Tok Hui Min and Zoe Eng suffered defeats against Germany and the United States of America in their first two matches, and were determined to put up a good performance in their match against the Europeans.

However, they were clearly outplayed by Belarus with captain Nadzeya Bohdan (#9) doing the damage. The 1.81 metre-tall centre scored freely and finished the match with a game-high 23 points.

Captain Hannah gave Singapore a positive start with a lay up on the first possession, but Belarus soon settled and quickly levelled through Bohdan, who then gave Belarus the lead at 4-2.

Midway through the first half, Hannah collected a long pass inside the paint to score, and put Singapore just two points behind at 4-6.

Singapore’s centre, Zoe, had the uneviable task of keeping Bohdan quiet but she was largely unsuccessful and had to resort to fouling the Belarussian.

It did not help that Bohdan was a relatively good free-throw shooter, getting five of her 23 points from the charity stripe. With 1 minute and 17 seconds remaining on the clock, Zoe collected her fourth foul and was replaced by Alanna.

Being of a smaller built, Alanna was unable to keep Bohdan quiet and the European was simply too much for the Singapore girls to handle. Her three-point play gave Belarus a 11-4 lead before she continued to extend her side’s lead to 15-6 at the end of the half.

Singapore were the first to score in the second half when Hannah made a free throw. Although she missed the second, Hui Min was on hand to collect the offensive rebound and made a lay up for two.

That small spark by Singapore only managed to ignite Belarus into their largest scoring run of the match. Zoe soon fouled out and Belarus scored 17 straight points as Singapore had no reply to their more sizeable and experienced opponents.

Careless ball-handling cost Singapore as they turned the ball over 12 times. Towards the end of the match, the local cagers started to tire and Belarus comfortably wrapped up the match.

Team manager Mr Khoo gave his thoughts on the game, saying, “Singapore just couldn’t stop the centre. She had a huge body and great skills as well! She is also a good free throw shooter. In the last 30 seconds of the match, you can see the girls are really tired.”

“From the spectator’s view, you might wonder why the girls are so tired, but it is really tough to defend against such a big player. You have to go in with twice the force to defend her.”

“Coming into the tournament, we couldn’t find someone to play against taller opponents,” said Zoe, who looked to be on the verge of tears.

“So I had to do it. I played very badly today and I fouled out. There wasn’t really a strategy to counter Nadzeya, I just had to defend against her. I know my coach is not too happy with my performance.”

“I have high hopes in my next match and I don’t want to foul out in that match so I can be of some use to the team. I don’t want to let the Singapore supporters down,” added the Temasek Polytechnic student.

“I don’t know how I should feel right now,” said Hannah after the match.

“It is hard to recover from such an intense match yesterday against the United States and we broke down physically and mentally,” explained Hannah, when asked why she felt they lost the game.

“They weren’t as physical or skilful as the Americans, but I guess we were playing at a sub-standard. Honestly I don’t know what happened.”

Singapore v Belarus 2nd Half:

Singapore v Belarus 1st Half: