By Dave Ryan

 

Durham Wildcats and Westminster Warriors will meet in the Patron's Cup final on February 28 after home victories on Sunday.

 

Wildcats hammered Plymouth Marjon 103-83 while Westminster survived a second half comeback to beat Mansfield Giants 88-77 as both sides booked a place at Crystal Palace.

 

Warriors certainly started well, rushing into a 39-11 first period lead, and they extended that to 56-25 going into the locker room at half-time. However, Giants started their comeback with a 21-11 third period, but although they outscored the home team 31-21 in the final stanza it was too late to prevent Westminster progressing to the final.

 

Bulambwe and Johnson each scored 19 for Warriors with Ogidan finishing on 18. Dan Watts led Giants with 24 and Martin added 17, but crucially Polish player Michal Ciesla was limited to nine.

 

After seeing Plymouth score four of the first six points, Wildcats took control of the game with a 25-4 spurt in which Paul Elderkin helped himself to a trey and two huge fast-break dunks, while Scott Morton provided four assists. All five starters had scored by the third minute, and Michael Davies (8 points) and Stephen Jones (6) showed up well at both ends of the court.

 

Mark Gillbard was the only Plymouth player posing a realistic scoring threat in the first period, and he contributed four of Marjon's eight points to close the quarter, as they reduced the margin to 11 at the break.

 

Durham responded with nine unanswered points early in the second, to lead 35-18, and although Plymouth responded, woeful shooting from the free-throw line (2-7 in the next five minutes) saw the visitors trail by 22 going into the final minutes of the half, and the Wildcats' cushion was 19 at the interval.

 

Plymouth managed to hold their own for much of the third period, with the lead still at 21 going into the final two minutes, but the game was becoming very scrappy and tetchy and when Gillbard fouled out with a foul and a technical foul, Paul Elderkin hit all four from the stripe and then drained a trey on the possession-after to take the score out to 74-46.

 

Paul Elderkin had an incredible 17 points in the quarter, including three from downtown and a dunk, but the Wildcats' discipline was beginning to waver and he was the next player to pick up a 'T' for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time to the officials, and in the closing minutes captain Mark Elderkin fouled out with two technicals. This time Plymouth kept their composure at the line, and their 13-2 surge to end the quarter included eight straight from the stripe.

 

Coach Dave Elderkin used the break to restore his players' composure, and though the visitors took the first five points of the final stanza cutting the margin to twelve, a Rafa Vilar-Franca steal set up young John Morgan for an easy fast-break, and Rafa himself added the next basket, for an 80-64 lead. A Morgan three settled any residual nerves, with the lead back out to 17.

 

Russell Martin was beginning to cause problems for the Wildcats' defence, with three threes in his eleven point haul, but Anthony Trigg was playing well under the basket, and contributed seven points in the closing spell as Durham cruised through to the final with a 20 point victory.

 

All ten of the Wildcats' players contributed points, and while Paul Elderkin led all scorers with 30, Scott Morton weighed in with a double-double of 13 points and ten assists.

 

Sean Porter led Plymouth with 19, with Matt Peard hitting 12 and Russell Martin, Mark Gilbard and John Peake 11 apiece.

 

"It's great to reach our first final," commented coach Elderkin, "But we do insist on doing things the hard way! We played excellent team basketball for long spells, but still managed to let ourselves down at times, and it could have cost us dearly.

 

"We're really excited at the prospect of going to Crystal Palace to face old adversaries Westminster Warriors, but there are a number of key league games between now and then, so we'll be concentrating on them.

 

"There are still a number of things that we need to work on, and one of them at the moment is certainly keeping our discipline."