Two matches to go for the season and at stake was retaining the top spot.
The Leopards played the Cougars who beat them last time and were playing to keep in the hunt for a finals spot.
It was a tightly fought first half with teams going bucket for bucket and Charlie trying to keep their main scorer from damaging Corowa too much on the scoreboard.
Charlie copped two early fouls in his defense which necessitated a sub to bring Harry Logie into centre. Harry has been working on being more physical in his game and it was on display.
Given the heat, the players rotated through the bench all half. Time out was called to talk through stopping their best player who had scored a few buckets by now. Charlie came back on and had their best player largely under control and stymied his scoring influence once our defensive positioning was changed.
The Cougars were leading 11-9 before the Corowa boys went on a 9-0 run to lead the Cougars by 7 points at the half way mark.
They knew they would come out hard and boy did they. The elbows were up, and the shoulders were being used however the Leopards bore their physicality (and uncalled offensive fouling) to hold their ground however the Cougars were on a run and quickly had cut the deficit and then took the lead 19-18.
Corowa were trying to drive for the basket however they had 3 players standing in their way a bit and it was causing them to turnover the ball. Time out called again.
The Leopard boys were doing a lot right however were predictable on offense and the message was to work them around, wait for the opening and be unpredictable where possible.
The Cougars then extended their lead and from there, with Corowa dropping a few buckets to take the lead back. It was a see-sawing contest from there until the final siren.
Josh Hunter had a cracking game at both ends of the court and was instrumental in Corowa’s 31-28 win, securing top spot and knocking the Cougars out of the finals race
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