KUWAIT CITY, Jan 21: Salvadore scored 53 including the last jumper for EMT to nail the victory against TFG 110-107 in a nail-biting inter-medical group game that traveled through two overtime periods at the weekend's Al-Ektasad United Exchange Company/Ultimate Tailoring PHILBACK (Philippines Basketball Club in Kuwait) 9th conference tournament games in Riggae.

The high-scoring game was gripped by uncertainty in the opening minutes as both teams battled hard with the first quarter going EMT’s way 15-10, Salvadore and Padri at the business end of the round accounting for 13 of their side’s 15 points. TFG rallied in the second quarter to take the driver's seat with Kirby wreaking havoc against the EMT to turn the table in the first five minutes of the second quarter but the ferocious attacks on the TFG defence by Padri with support from Aquino quickly rolled back the TFG momentary advantage to close the first half 24-22, EMT two points ahead. EMT widened the point gap culminating in a 10-point deficit for Friday at the close of the third quarter, 52-62.

The charged last quarter had fans in frenzy with Padri for EMT and Kerby for TFG leading the attack. A series of 2-pointers filled both baskets. But the to TFG, the game was only just beginning as Kirby and Jay stepped up with support from  Jeck, Aquino and Bautista to bring the battle to the vital areas of EMT as the latter also continued their assault on the TFG hoop.

With the game going down to the wire at that stage, both sides finished the fourth round on par at 86-86, flinging the doors open for an overtime duel. The overtime again ended in a stalemate at 100-100, culminating in a second  overtime that saw a pitched battle raging with both sides trading baskets and as the scores tied at 107-107, Salvadore threw a final jumper to break the stalemate, handing EMT the 110-107 win.

The game essentially was driven by two players on each side, Salvadore who finished with 53 in the win and Padri at 31, while on the TFG side their loss was paced by Kerby’s 48 with support from Jay who also scored 21.

The next of the 13- game schedule saw Inter-Company giants First Kuwaiti humbled 49-84 by the combined firepower Americana Nuggets’ Alesna and Guevara who made 43 points between them in the lopsided match. Guevara’s early jumper opened the floodgates for Americana in the opening minutes of the game and was quickly picked on by Chronic and Paderon who chipped in a few baskets. Guevara accounted for 13 of the American’s 21 scored in the first round that ended 21-13 for his side.

Alesna took over scoring for Americana from the second round and remained the most prolific at the hoops for the Americana side and in the entire game finishing with 25 in the game that saw the food specialists leap from win to win as the rounds went by to finish at 84-49 at the buzzer. Guevara also made some important contribution to the Americana win with his 18 points. Pacing First Kuwaiti’s loss were Novada, Gonzales and Yap who scored 11, 10 and 10 apiece.

On the other hand, another tough inter-company encounter was on the cards when COE-Kharafi took on Kuwait Steel. Kuwait Steel prevailed 73-70.  But the victory didn’t come on a silver platter as Kharafi led by Orienza, Esmeralda and Guevara who finished with 19, 15 and 12 in the game, through the rounds kept their scorecard clicking to stay on the tail of the Steel masters. The Kuwait-Steel win was scripted by Bacucanag, Orlan and Labadan’s 21, 15 and 10 points.

On the other side of the hard court, Kalexco’ s Viernes and Cortez lived up to their fans’ expectations when they led the squad to a  76-70 overtime win against Mathar after a nail-biting 62-62 full time result. Viernes went ahead to make 25 points with Cortez chipping in a valuable 21.

The pattern of the game clearly showed Kalexco maintaining a slim lead in the opening round and then widening the lead as the rounds progressed  well into the third where the scores cumbered 21-20, 40-30, 60-40. A Mathar rally in the final quarter scripted by Ray and Hamoud, saw the game turned into a stalemate at the close of the round, 62-62. But a jumper by Viernes followed by quick successive 3-pointers by Cortez and Sison saw Kalexco claw their way back onto the driver’s seat to close at 76-70 after the overtime. Viernes scored 25 in the game including 8 in the final stretch while Cortez contributed 21. Rey and Hamoud finished with 20 and 19 in the Mathar loss.

Meanwhile in the next game, Matrix were handed their second defeat in as many matches when their clash against LDJ-Ilonggo ended in an 84-70 score line in favour of the latter. After drawing first blood with a 2-pointer,Ilonggo’s captain Alex Ramacion with assistance from Cris Taub and the rest of the team, successfully managed to execute their team strategy of fast attack and solid defence to keep the opposition trailing throughout the game, 25-15, 44-31, 66-45 and 84-74. Ramacion netted 30 with Taub assisting with 14 in the win. Though overwhelmed by Ilonggo’s ability to sustain the high-tempo game all through the rounds, Al-Os and Palconan managed to get some decent scoring to their names 31 and 14 apiece.

Game six saw Falcons put the brakes on Adan’s winning run with a 71-60 defeat. Falcons prevailed in all rounds of the game with Caymo, Alcantara, Pascual and Francis finding the Adan hoop for the win. Caymo did the most damage to the Adan defence scoring 18 points while Julfre Miles and Dennis Polliquit scored 14 and 13 to pace the Adan loss.

In the first 5’8” group match of the day, Azkals thrashed Al-Tazaj 82-40. The entire game was dominated by Alkals with Al-Tazaj showing little sign of a comeback at any point.  The rounds ended 22-8, 36-24, 52-34 and 82-40 in favour of Azkals who played an evenly distributed game with De La Cruz and Valencia leading the side’s score sheet with 12 and 10 points. Nicholas Oliver on the hand was the talisman of the Al-Tazaj side accounting for 18 of the team’s 40 points in the game.

In the rest of the weekend’s games, Nadec edged Tamaraws 54-52 also in the 5’8” group while Mismo convincingly won 81-74 against Ace in an open division encounter.  The Hasawi team was another open division winner at the weekend with their 65-61 victory against an exhausted Nadec side still recovering from the hard won victory against Tamaraws in an earlier match.

Tournament favourites OIC Stallions also had an easy win over Derby, dominating in all rounds to finish 78-50 in the next game. Best scorer in the game was Milla at 36 in the Stallions’ win with Matimtim also garnering 13 for the Derby side. Tyramed for their part, lost to KTC 54-65 while in the penultimate game Panasonic chalked a narrow win against PSK 66-64. The final match of the day saw War Commander defeat JIL 67-64 to close the day.