Anglia Ruskin 96 – Ipswich 81
Ipswich fell to their first defeat of the season when they travelled to Anglia Ruskin on Saturday in a game between two teams that had started the season 2-0.
ARU are the back-to-back WNBL Division One Play-off Champions and started the 2019/2020 season as one of the favourites to win it all this coming season, and their performance against the young Ipswich side, did nothing to deter their reputation as the league’s heavy hitters.
Ipswich, who continue to play without GB international Esther Little, fought valiantly for the full forty minutes, and have good reason to feel that the fifteen point margin flatters their more experienced opponents, as the game was a hotly contested one for the whole game. However, every time Ipswich looked like closing the gap, ARU simply closed the door, enabling the Cambridge based outfit to extend their start to the season to 3-0.
“I thought we played some good basketball for periods of the game today, but this ARU team are right there with the best teams we have played in our three season’s at senior level” said Head Coach Nick Drane. Drane added “We are not making any excuses, they beat us today because they were better than us today – we need to get better and get back to work as we now turn our attention to Thames Valley nect weekend and a chance to get back to winning ways”.
Ipswich travel to newly promoted Thames Valley Cavaliers (1-2) next Saturday where they will look to move to a 3-1 record for the first month of the season.
Colleen ‘Coco’ Leung led all Ipswich scorers with a season high 25, while Harriet Welham was ‘held’ to twenty-one points by a well drilled ARU defence.
Final Score
Anglia Ruskin University 96 Ipswich Basketball 81
Top Scorers:
Coco Leung 25, Harriet Welham 21 & Cameron Taylor Willis 10