Leopards 75 (19,42,63)
Worthing Thunder 98 (18,57,78)

Game Stats

Leopards’ poor form continued as they missed out on a home play-off quarter-final following a heavy defeat against Worthing, on Saturday.

The Big Cats never recovered from a poor second period which saw them outscored 39-23, and they will now have to travel to Bristol Academy Flyers in the play-offs.

Sam Salter led the hosts’ scoring with 16, with Errol Seaman adding 13 and Gareth Laws 12.

It was a disappointing end to the home season for Jon Burnell’s team, who were joint top of the EBL Division One in mid-January, but have won only one of their last six games.

Worthing opened the scoring through Danny Hildreth and Ryan Marrast, before Laws got the home side off the mark, and with Salter adding a trey, the Big Cats went 5-4 up.

The sides exchanged baskets, before four unanswered Thunder points helped them open a 16-11 lead, but a strong finish to the period saw Matt Eames, Latham-Henry and Fola Adeleke all score to send the home side into the first break with a 19-18 lead.

A Latham-Henry trey followed by an Adeleke jump shot saw that lead grow to six points, and the score was 25-20 before a 16-1 Worthing run with nine points from Dan Midgley and five from James Brame gave the visitors a 34-25 advantage.

Sam Salter's second triple for the home side closed the gap back to four, before a further 13-4 run with nine points for Bates extended the lead to 13 at 47-34 and from there on the lead stayed in double figures for the remainder of the game, despite Leopards Salter draining another long-range effort.

The third period saw a barrage of three-pointers from the Leopards, with Matt Collins (twice), Salter, Laws and Latham-Henry all scoring from down-town, but they were never able to get the deficit below 13, and they went into the final break trailing 78-63.

Laws was the only player to trouble the scorers for Leopards during the opening six minutes of the fourth quarter, as Thunder came out with an 11-2 run to increase the gap to 24 with four minutes remaining to wrap up the victory.

Leopards: S Salter 16, E Seaman 13, G Laws 12, C Latham-Henry 10, M Collins 8, F Adeleke 8, M Eames 8, L Volskis, R Lloyd, B Warden