MSC Court rehabilitation pushes Royals Final Four back

Apr 28, 2011 Sports

Dave Plass

KWAKWANI EXPELLED FROM 2011 CHAMPIONSHIP

By Edison Jefford

The Mackenzie Sports Club (MSC) Basketball Court Rehabilitation Project, which commenced last week after months of impediments, has forced the Victory Valley Royals Schools Final Four out of the Linden Town Week Celebrations, this week.
Kaieteur Sport understands that the home of the tournament, the MSC Court, will not be finished in time for tomorrow’s Final. The Final Four competition was expected to start yesterday, but works on the surface of the facility has postponed the event.
“We were keeping our fingers crossed this week in the hope that the court would have been done for us to complete the tournament but unfortunately the court wouldn’t finish in time,” President of the Royals Basketball Club, Linden “Sancho” Alphonso said.
Alphonso believes that it was better for them to wait on the completion of the premier basketball court in Linden rather than move the tournament to the proposed Mackenzie High School Court, which does not have an International Basketball Federation (FIBA) regulation size.
“We looked at a protest from one of the teams that stated that Mackenzie High (one of the team’s in the Final Four) will have an advantage on their home court. It was a fair complaint, so that and the size of the court helped us decide against that,” Alphonso noted.

Linden Alphonso

The United States-based former player and ex-Coach of the national female team was predicting heated contests within the Town Week Celebrations when all the overseas-based Lindeners are at home in the community. He could not announce new dates yesterday.
The Regional Office in Linden had awarded the contracts for the re-laying of the surface and the construction of the bleachers to separate contractors. But before the bleachers could be erected, it was agreed that the court’s surface would have been done.
A contractor’s broken-down paver was initially blamed for the non-progress of the resurfacing of the court. The management of the Sports Club was forced to wait for seven months before works could finally commence at the venue in the latter half of last week.
Meanwhile, one of the most prolific and decorated basketball-playing teams at the schools’ level in Guyana, Kwakwani Secondary School, was expelled from the 2011 tournament for reportedly including a player who does not attend school on their roster.
“Maybe this decision should have been taken a long time ago; we met with officials from the education office and we’ve decided to expel Kwakwani since we believe that they had what can be called an ‘unfair advantage in the tournament’,” Alphonso said.
Kwakwani had included former junior national point guard, Dave Plass on their roster to contest the event, but tournament officials subsequently discovered that Plass was not attending school, which was in breach of one of the rules of the competition.
Alphonso said that the decision was communicated to Kwakwani Coach, Ann Gordon, who had decided two weeks ago to continue playing in the competition under protest. Kwakwani was one of the favourite schools to win the 2011 Championship.