The University of Johannesburg produced a relentless surge in the last quarter to defeat UP-Tuks 64-57 in the Varsity Basketball final at Wits in Johannesburg yesterday.<\/p>\n
It was a memorable victory, which confirmed the Orange Army’s dominant status in varsity basketball as earlier this year they also won the University Sport South Africa title.<\/p>\n
In addition, they were the winners of the Gauteng University Basketball League.<\/p>\n
Trailing 55-50 with five minutes left, UJ made intelligent use of their power play to seize the advantage and they stayed ahead until the end.<\/p>\n
For coach Mandla Ngema it was a feeling of relief when it was all over.<\/p>\n
“It is always difficult to play as favourites because there is a lot of pressure on us and we also put pressure on ourselves,” said the UJ mentor.<\/p>\n
“But for the guys to pull it through in the end when we were behind for most of the match is a great feeling.”<\/p>\n
He acknowledged the tough challenge which UP-Tuks had presented under coach George Makena.<\/p>\n
“Thanks to UP-Tuks for the final and we have a lot of respect for them,” added Ngema.<\/p>\n
“They battled last year but have really come back and what they did this week to reach the final is mind-boggling. A lot of credit must go to coach Makena, the best coach in the country without a doubt.”<\/p>\n
UJ star Lance Lance Chikore was voted the tournament’s Most Valuable Player and said winning the title meant they had achieved a dream.<\/p>\n
“I’m so happy because we have been working towards this the whole year and I am very proud of my teammates and what they have put into their games.<\/p>\n
“Last year was a tough season for us and this Varsity Basketball has been a hard challenge, but we are just grateful to have come through in the end.”<\/p>\n
Although UP-Tuks called the shots for most of the game, Chikore said he had urged the team to stay focused until the end.<\/p>\n
“I believe everything is about hard work and being strong in the mind. Although they were up, I told my teammates to just keep our heads up and to focus on closing the gap basket by basket.”<\/p>\n
Captain Trystan Speck summed up the team’s emotions when he said the final result was “just overwhelming”.<\/p>\n
“I really have no words for what I’m feeling at the moment,” he said in the post-match interview.<\/p>\n
“The team has worked really hard throughout the year and this second week of Varsity Basketball was tough, but we managed to come through.<\/p>\n
“Congratulations to UP-Tuks for making it a final to remember and I also want to thank all our fans for their fantastic support this year.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The University of Johannesburg produced a relentless surge in the last quarter to defeat UP-Tuks 64-57 in the Varsity Basketball final at Wits in Johannesburg yesterday. It was a memorable victory, which confirmed the Orange Army’s dominant status in varsity basketball as earlier this year they also won the University Sport South Africa title. In […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":58746,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1852,3745,1733,3743],"class_list":["post-33135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-more-sport","tag-basketball","tag-uj-basketball","tag-university-of-johannesburg","tag-varsity-basketball"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33135\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}