Omar Clarke is understandably down at the moment.
His Tarheels were eliminated from the division one basketball playoffs over the weekend. The side were soundly swept by the Dominos Warriors in two games after a 6-6 regular season campaign that saw a postseason berth for the first time in years.
Clarke, 25, can only see the problems with his side.
“We have a lot of work to do, especially on defence,” Clarke said. “In game two we held them down in the first half before losing our edge in the second half. They had the better team but we were never intimidated. Every year they grab up good players and every year they have a good team.
“Our team never had composure or chemistry. We didn’t build those up until the end and that’s when we started winning. At the start everyone did their own thing. But when everyone played their part we beat team Philippines and Dominos.”
By and large Clarke had a forgettable series against the Warriors. In a 36-point blowout in game one, he had just four points and one assist (though he mustered 10 rebounds). In game two’s 80-54 defeat he was slightly better with 13 points and five rebounds. Clarke states he was not pleased with his showing though some of his team-mates did do well.
“To me I didn’t play good enough. I was tired late in games. I feel we have to stop making the league once a year. Once the league stops I stop playing, I don’t even play pick-up games. For athletes like me the concern is getting hurt in things like pick-up games. There should be summer leagues every year because I feel like I lose my skills without another adult competition.
“On our team Andrew Wisdom was team captain and he did good. Ransford Welcome fights to the bitter end and is one of the backbones of the team. He hustles a lot and gets rebounds and points for us. Plunkett (Rohan Webster) came through for us in game two and our other guard Patrick (Barnes) also did well.
“If we train ahead of next season we should do better. We had hardly any training this year. Even though we play with heart we need people. This year we had no changes other than Ovaine (Monteith) leaving and we missed out on signing Dominos’ tall man Boka (Borislav Djordjic).”
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