Guangdong bites Sharks to reach final
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Guangdong Hongyuan Southern Tigers reached the finals of the CBA after brushing aside the Shanghai Sharks 103-75 last night to take their best-of-five semifinals 3-1.
It is the eighth consecutive time that the defending champions have reached the finals, where they will take on Xinjiang Snow Leopards, who beat Zhejiang Lions 3-0.
Last night's game at the Yuanshen Sports Center in Shanghai fizzled out for local fans early in the fourth quarter when Guangdong led by more than 20 points with a slew of three-pointers. Overall, the visitors shot 47.8 percent.
The Sharks failed to catch up in the first half of the fourth quarter and all but threw in the towel by sending on their bench players.
"We played a good game tonight and we did well in defense, offense, rebounds and the control of turnovers," commented Guangdong coach Li Chunjiang. "We successfully restrained John Lucas III (12 points and 4 assists) for the first time in this series."
Five Tigers scored in double figures - William 'Smush' Parker (19), Zhu Fangyu (19), Zhou Peng (16), David Harrison (11) and Chen Dawei (10) while Liu Wei with a game-high 29 and Cai Liang with 10 complemented Lucas for the Sharks.
Although the Sharks lost the game, they still earned much applause from the 5,000 home fans after "an incredible season," coach Robert Donewald insisted.
"We're just getting started. The season was the beginning of great things to come."
The Sharks ranked 17 of 18 teams in the CBA league last season and reached the semifinals with a new coach and unheralded foreign players.
"We will come back next season," said captain and point guard Liu. "I'm a little bit reconciled to the loss but we learned a lot from Guangdong through this series."
The first game of the best-of-seven finals will be on Friday, with the Tigers facing Xinjiang on their home court.
Guangdong has been dominating the CBA league, having won five titles and being runners-up twice in the last eight years.
