Guangdong get match point in CBA finals

Xinhua, April 25, 2011

Guangdong player Zhu Fangyu shoots in the best-of-five series of CBA finals on Sunday. Guangdong defeated Xinjiang with 110-104 to grab the match point.

After a tight brawl with Xinjiang Guanghui, defending champions Guangdong Hongyuan sealed the second home win 110-104 on Sunday to grab the match point first in the best-of-five series 3-2 of CBA finals.

Thanks to a 7-0 run driven by Quincy Dubby, Xinjiang's top scorer, the road team took their first lead when Dubby made a shot after being squashed by Guangdong nearly the whole first half. James Singleton did a better job by chipping in 20 points to help Xinjiang ennjoy a 5-point lead on 55-50 to enter the second.

"We didn't play well in the third quarter. Seven turnovers in one period. It's intolerable," Jiang Xingquan, Xinjiang's head coach, who was hounded to the edge of the cliff, said after two road losses.

As a witness of Guangdong's six-champion dynasty in the past seven years, super shooter Wang Shipeng, who snatched a team-high 29 points, stood out to take the spotlight in the third period with 6-for-8 at three-point lines. With Hudson's sharp penetration in the paint, the duo led with a 12-0 surge louder answer to regain advantage.

Then the game stuck into the seesaw battle before Wang buried a three point down the stretch to help Guangdong usurp the lead on 103-99 with no more than two minutes left. Relying on decent defense, the defending champions kept the six-point gap till the end to get the match point first.

The two teams will move back to Xinjiang to fight for the last two games, slated for 27 and 29th.