Women look to get off the mark as men host Reading
It’s a big weekend of London Lions’ NBL Division One teams as they continue their contrasting starts to the season.
The women look for their first win in three outings when they host Nottingham Trent University at Barking Abbey School (2pm) while a couple of hours later the men look for their third straight victory when Reading Rockets are the visitors.
Women’s coach David Lavinier admits to only having limited knowledge about the midlands side:
“They’re well coached, and we’ll need to do some scouting this week. Hopefully we’ll have a few more players available and pick up our first win” he said.
Nottingham were hammered 79-36 by Thames Valley Cavaliers in their only game of the campaign, while Lions went close to upsetting back-to-back champions Ipswich last week.
Men’s coach James Vear is expecting a tough game against a Rockets team who have split their opening two games with a narrow opening day loss against champions Solent Kestrels before a big win against Leicester Warriors
“I think they’re a team looking at a top four finish” he said. “They’ve improved with some good signings and they’re well coached. They’ll be a tough test, but we’ll spend the week preparing and we’ll watch a lot of game tape.”
There’s a battle of Lions’ Division Three teams as University of East London host Barking Abbey. Both sides made winning start to the league campaigns last week as UEL won all four periods in a 70-51 home victory against Brent Bulls while Barking Abbey overcame a slow start to beat CoLA Southwick Pride 73-56.
There’s also plenty of junior action for the young Lions on Saturday with the under-16 boys hosting Ipswich and the girls making the short trip to Goresbook to face Barking RDF. The under-14 boys travel to Baltic Stars, while the under-16 boys second team travel to face Brentwood Fire II. Sunday sees the under-16 boys II again in action when they host NASSA.
While it was a quiet week for Lions’ college teams, Andre Lockhart’s Newham College Lions travelled to Harris Academy Crystal Palace and overcame a slow start to win 82-64 to improve their record to 2&0.
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