WCBA 6/2008 - Shangdong 66, Beijing 63

Beijing (2-4) has gotten off to a slow start, despite the addition of Jennifer Lacy. In wins and losses for the year, Shangdong (4-2) was almost evenly matched, but it appears that Beijing will fall further behind, as a fourth-quarter comeback gives Shangdong the 66-63 win. Sue Yeijing made the final two point bucket for Shangdong.

The boxscore is here.

Beijing began to pull into the lead in the second quarter, leading 37-31 at the half. However, Shangdong kept up with Beijing during the third quarter, and Beijing still led by six after three, 52-46. In the fourth quarter, Beijing was held to just 11 points as Shangdong came from behind to steal the win.

According to the writeup at the WCBA website, the Beijing team just folded under the pressure of the Shangdong counterattack.

The eventual winners only shot 36 percent from the field, compared to 43 percent from Beijing. However, Beijing lost the battle in other components of the game. They were outrebounded 39-24, with Shangdong winning the offensive rebounds battle as well.

What was worse was that Beijing was never sent to the free throw line. That's right, a zero-for-zero percentage. Whereas Shangdong was sent to the line 21 times, getting 14 points given away by Beijing. Was it just "wink-and-a-nod" refereeing on behalf of home team Shangdong? Or was it just one of those fluke games where you can't win for losing?

Google Translator can provide some unintentional humor. Sun Weiying scored 15 points to lead all Shandgong players, and Yu Jie added to the victory with 13 points and three rebounds. "Si Secretary" had 10 points and "In Young" had seven points and 14 rebounds.

You can't say that Shangdong didn't fight. There was a scary moment when Cao Fei of Shangdong (3 points, 3 rebounds) succumbed to leg cramps. She had to be taken to the hospital for treatment.

I wonder if "Si Secretary" and "In Young" are "foreign aid" players, or if it's just a case of Google Translate adding flavor.

In the House of Zhang (Beijing), Zhang Fan led with 21 points and Zhang Wei followed after with 16 points. Jennifer Lacy would score 14 points on excellent 7-for-9 shooting and four rebounds. However, Lacy only got to play 24 minutes. The team only had eight active players; I wonder why they couldn't give some of the court time of Zhang Lin (0 points, 15 minutes) or Zhang Zhi (0 points, 3 minuteS). (I blame nepotism.)

Pictures will come if they exist. In the WCBA, they usually don't.