Vancouver Bandits won a nail-biter on the road against the Winnipeg Sea Bears at Canada Life Centre on Saturday, July 13.
In just his second game of the season, Bandits big man Mitch Creek was a nuisance inside and led the team to a 102-99 triumph with 31 points and eight rebounds. He said the Vancouver ball movement played a big factor in the win.
鈥淵ou just try and play the game the right way. I'm not trying to mix it up too much .. just trying to be a little bit smarter than everyone else, and then allow my teammates to get some great looks as well,鈥� Creek said.
With Taz茅 Moore out for the contest and Koby McEwen also leaving the game early, Nick Ward and Diego Maffia stepped up for Vancouver.
Ward鈥檚 22 points on 10-12 shooting allowed him to surpass current Sea Bear Alex Campbell for the Bandits鈥� all-time regular season points record.
Meanwhile, Maffia was scorching hot from beyond the arc, netting 14 points on 5-7 shooting from the floor and 4-6 from three to go along with six assists.
鈥� That鈥檚 standard Diego. Unfortunately, he doesn't get as many minutes as he could on our team, but .. he does that all the time,鈥� Bandits鈥� head coach Kyle Julius said.
Despite an off night, Zach Copeland managed 12 points and eight rebounds, in addition to the Target Score winner.
鈥�
鈥淚 thought that our guys just stayed poised and we were pretty focused during Target [Score] Time,鈥� Julius said.
Overall, Winnipeg hit seven threes in the opening 20 minutes. McEwen鈥檚 pair of contested jumpers from beyond the arc in the first quarter were the only threes of the half for Vancouver. The Bandits shot 54 per cent from the field overall, but just 20 per cent from long range. Vancouver also turned the ball over nine times in the first half, while Winnipeg was careful in possession and didn鈥檛 record a turnover.
Vancouver improves to 11-5 and return to first place in the Western Conference standings, while Winnipeg drops to 7-8 in fourth place.
Bandits and Sea Bears will play each other again on Thursday, July 18 at 7 p.m. at Langley Events Centre.
