Report: Scorchers 58-69 Lions

A limited Surrey Scorchers roster took a narrow defeat at Surrey Sports Park on Saturday evening as local rivals the London Lions secured a 58-69 victory to kick off the season

Five new faces made their debuts for Scorchers, including starting spots for Kalil Irving, Albert Margai and Mike Ochereobia, but with two American imports yet to arrive in England Coach Creon was left with too few bodies to keep the intensity up for a full 40 minutes which left the hosts without a win on the opening night.

Scorchers made the perfect start to the home tie, leading by as many as 10 points thanks to a Will Neighbour jump shot with 1.04 left on the Q1 clock, and took a 21-13 lead into the first break.

A 2-14 run early in Q2 saw London cruise into the lead as a string of missed attempts on the basket cost Scorchers their hard work from the opening minutes. Ogedengbe stopped the rot midway into the quarter before 6 late points closed the gap down to 3 at half time (38-41).

Neighbour continued his positive return in Q3, scoring from downtown to make it a 1 point game, only for the class of Alex Owumi to shine through and push Lions to a 8 point lead heading into the final stanza (49-57).

The hosts were certainly in no mind to be disgraced by the experienced visitors though, and they held on to keep the deficit down in Q4 as London went on to secure a 58-69 win on the road to kick off the 2016/17 BBL season.
Neighbour led the home scorers on the night with 18 points, closely followed by a solid 13 points from debutant Mike Ochereobia.

Scorchers return to action on Sunday afternoon with a trip to the south west to face the Plymouth Raiders in a 4pm tip-off, before welcoming last year’s play-off runners up the Leicester Riders at Surrey Sports Park on Friday evening (7.30pm tip-off).

Tickets for all home games this season are on sale now – click here to buy online.

Box Score

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Neighbour lights it up with a 3 – his first of the evening. Scorchers lead by 2 #ScorchersLive pic.twitter.com/k5CSSiBnjY

— Surrey Scorchers (@surreyscorchers) September 24, 2016

He's known for those big rebounds! @LeagueReady_NBA takes Scorchers to 45 and a 2 point deficit #ScorchersLive pic.twitter.com/JaL427Zz5k

— Surrey Scorchers (@surreyscorchers) September 24, 2016

A sneak preview of the photo gallery from last night's game – more to follow this week! #TheBBL ??

? @robsamblesphoto pic.twitter.com/yPOYatFs3K

— Surrey Scorchers (@surreyscorchers) September 25, 2016