Muslim Basketball

In a much more defensive oriented season, they still struggled to get wins. They just don’t have the fire power to go toe to toe with most teams in this league.

Was not pretty, but a win is a win.

I thought they were going to get the win against the youngsters and Damascus, but they were outplayed. They’re pretty good shooters percentage wise and they find ways to move the ball around, but defense and rebounding really plagues them. Maybe they will end the regular season on a high note and beat two beatable opponents.

It’s hard to win games when you give up over 50 points. When you give up over 70, you do not stand a chance. Season high of 22 for Anad, who may be the only bright spot in a dark Suba season. He’s been a very under the radar scorer –  he’s ninth most in the league with an average of 14.5ppg.

They have been playing teams tough all season long (except for that 31 point loss to Sana’a week 4). They need to find a way to turn close games into wins, or else they’ll end the season with very few wins. They do have three winnable games left, if they can grab them and move up in the rankings, they could possibly get a favorable matchup in round one.

Anand had an alright game, he and Shahaan did enough to get their team the win. They played good defense, but Tehran’s offense is tied for least PPG. They have a couple winnable games left on the schedule, so they could make some noise and move up the bottom third of the rankings.  

Overall just a poor performance for this team. Anand’s hot shooting start cooled off dramatically, as he could only buy one bucket on 14 attempts. Ryan had an okay game with 6 points and 7 boards, but that was not nearly enough as Sana’a dominated every facet of the game. They have Tehran next week in a game both teams really need – look for Suba to come out hungry and try to steal their first win of the year.

Gave Mombasa some issues in the second half. Had a couple breakout games from Neil and Shahaan, but Mombasa is often lethargic defensively when their offense is working against what they believe to be lesser competition. Don’t be surprised if they take down Sana’a next week, but I’ll need to see a 1 in the W column before I put another team behind them.

Overmatched by a tough, gritty, and experienced Istanbul team. Anand showed that he is a solid offensive player in this league for a second consecutive week. Just got totally out rebounded and outplayed played a more complete team. It will be tough for them to get many wins in this league, but they have shown that they can compete. If they start getting some other contributions, maybe they’ll be able to grab a couple games.

Saw a lot of good things from Suba in their matchup against Granada. If it wasn’t for an unfortunate final minute, they would have pulled off an early season upset. Anand Parikh challenged Granada’s perimeter defense while their frontcourt gave Granada’s big men all they could handle. Out rebounded and out shot Granada, but their ultimate demise was their inability to end the game without fouling.

 No major changes to last season’s squad who ranked last in many offensive statistical categories. Only bright spot is that they can defend. They have a week one matchup with Granada, who struggles often against teams they should dispose of.