Bristol Flyers’ hopes of reaching their second major final since joining the British Basketball League (BBL) were ended as London Lions’ former NBA talent pounced in the sides’ last-four BBL Cup clash.
Despite a courageous, battling performance in front of a sell-out home crowd, which was a huge improvement on the 35-point blowout defeat the same opposition inflicted on them in the capital on Friday, the Flyers were unable to slow down the BBL league leaders, who won 79-97 at SGS College Arena on Monday night.
Led by 20-point performances from forward Sam Dekker and centre Kosta Koufos, the Lions’ quality ultimately shone through, answering every question Bristol asked of them.
The two sides traded buckets in the early exchanges, before former Houston Rockets, LA Clippers and Cleveland Cavaliers player Dekker and debutant Jordan Taylor - himself an experienced EuroLeague vet - found their range with some crisp jump shots from the elbow. The early six-point run helped establish a lead that London would not relinquish the rest of the way.
In a response that typified the fight they showed throughout the match, sharp shooter Brandon Mahan drained a corner three moments after coming off the bench. From the resulting restart Lions big Josh Sharma stepped onto the court before passing the ball, turning possession over to the Flyers.
Bristol then worked the ball back over to Mahan again for another triple, cutting the lead to one point and sending the Flyers faithful into raptures. Mahan did not miss a single shot from the field for the whole game, making five of five of five from deep.
The guard benefited from some wide open looks as the Flyers shared the ball well, their ball movement evidenced by 20 team assists.
Perimeter shooting is a cornerstone of Bristol’s offensive identity, with the team often living and dying by the three-ball. Forward Thomas Bell III, told BristolLive after reviewing Friday’s league game at the Copper Box Arena, in which they only made four of 26 attempts from deep, the team had reflected they had “settled too much” from long range.
The Flyers certainly seemed more patient in attack on Monday, taking more touches in the paint and driving more in the lane as they looked to either make space for open looks, or get to the rim. They ended up shooting a decent percentage from beyond the arc, 45 pre cent from nine of 20 shooting, while from two-point range they were only shot 36 per cent.
The Flyers had to contend with some tall timber on either end of the floor. The Lions’ towering bigs, including Koufos, Sharma, both 7 ft and Tomislav Zubcic and Vojtech Hruban, 6ft 9 and 6 ft 8 respectively, dominated inside.
Koufos, a 12-year NBA vet who previously played on the Sacramento Kings and the Memphis Grizzlies, in particular shone. He produced three blocks on the defensive end, while on offense he seemed to be able to manoeuvre around the paint and drop the ball in from close range at will.
It seemed like every time the Flyers were able to get a swing in momentum, such as Mahan’s back-to-back threes in the first quarter, London - who scarily were missing a few players for this one - had a response.
The Lions, who have impressed in European competition this season, dropped 32 for an 11-point lead after the first 10-minute quarter. Dekker was a delight to watch, with remarkable hang time as he glided through the air to the basket for a number of tough reverse lay-ups.
The Flyers did not give in though, coming out hard with an 11-6 start to the second period to cut the lead to seven, including threes from VJ King and the brilliant Tevin Olison, who posted an efficient, team-high 17 points.
Despite conceding considerable length to the Lions, who scored 30 more points in the paint, The Flyers, as always, went after it off the ball and were only out rebounded by two boards.
An increasingly committed, chippy contest, saw words exchanged between opposing players and coaching staff alike. Sharma was denied what would have been a poster slam dunk, when he was sent sprawling after clattering hard into King, though thankfully he got back to his feet to hobble off.
Bristol were made to rue a few missed free throws which if added might have helped to turn the pressure up on their opponents, as once more the Lions bit back and at the half were up by 16.
The pattern repeated in the second half, with Dekker again showing glimpses of why he has played the game at the highest level. He coolly drained a clutch three with one second on the shot clock and completed a flowing team play with a big uncontested flush, as the Lions continued to stretch their lead to 20 after three frames.
But the Flyers were having moments of their own and would not go away. A laser-like bounce pass from Jelani-Watson Gayle found the galloping Malcolm Delpeche, and the centre took it to the tin with a two-handed dunk.
Once more epitomising the Flyers’ unwavering steel was a play that capped off a 6-0 Bristol run in the final quarter. Point guard Michael Miller stole the ball off Dekker, instigating a feast break down the court, before lobbing the ball up to Delpeche to tip it in for the ‘alley-oop’.
This trimmed the Lions lead to 11 again with around four minutes left on the game clock, and had fans daring to dream of an unlikely comeback.
However, these hopes were dashed soon after, as Koufos once more made it look easy inside with two quick baskets, before Taylor gathered a Flyers turnover to put it firmly out of reach.
After the buzzer Bell III, who put in a typically hard nosed display with 15 points and seven rebounds, said while it “sucked” to miss out on reaching the cup final, he praised the victors for their “composed” performance.
“You’ve got to give them their credit," he said. "We fought as hard as we could, but they’ve been in wars before they’ve been in battles. I’m not surprised they didn’t falter after what we did, so credit to them, they did their job. They took one at their place and they got one in our house, but we’ve just got to take it as a learning experience and be ready. This is good for us.”
Dekker told BristolLive he and his teammates were “excited” for the opportunity to play either Leicester Riders or Caledonia Gladiators in the final, adding that SGS, where they lost to the Flyers last month, was “a tough place to play”.
“[The Flyers] shoot the ball well here, they’re comfortable here. Beating them two days ago at our place, they were going to come out wanting to respond. They are a very talented team, and you could see they played with energy tonight. We were able to get off to a nice early lead, and we rode that to the end.”
Bristol Flyers head coach Andreas Kapoulas added while there was “disappointment” among the group to not make the BBL Cup Final - which the club last reached in 2020, only to lose to Worcester Wolves - he could have no complaints with his side’s performance against “quality” opposition.
“I’m proud of our guys and what we need to do is give credit to London for the two game series. I think we helped them elevate their game," Kapoulas said. "They played well on Friday, they had to play even better today to beat us. You’ve got to give credit to them for that.
“I love our guys, it would have been great to be in a final together. We have other opportunities, the BBL Trophy is coming up, and certainly nothing is over in the league, there are the play-offs happening too. There can be disappointment with a loss, but we battled really hard and we made London take another level up in their game.”
