Indian Navy (Lonavala) crashed to its third straight loss, going down 71-64 against Indian Railway, in the 52nd all India basketball tournament, for the Nachimuthu Gounder Cup, here on Sunday.
Meanwhile, Indian Overseas Bank (Chennai) opened its account with a 75-64 win over the Navy team in its opening league clash on Saturday night.
The bankmen took some time to settle down as they did not want to risk it much on a newly-laid court. And the men from Lonavala, who were tamed by host CDBA (Coimbatore) in the opener, took advantage of the situation and played a power-packed game through Kamal and Amal in the first quarter.
IOB, the Federation Cup runner-up, meanwhile played a waiting game. It believed in its players ability and experience to rattle any opponent. But the team had it eyes on the scoreboard and also made sure that its opponent did not gain the big edge.
The last two quarters saw the IOB men in full flow and the points started to flow easy. After gaining solid command, coach Azeez Ahamed rotated his bench and they made merry as well. P. Jeevanantham and Prasanna Venkatesh scored 21 and 15 points respectively.
The results Men: Indian Railway (Delhi) 71 (Gaurav Ohlan 12, Praveen Kumar 13) bt Indian Navy (Lonavala) 64 (Amal 17, Tudu 15).
On Saturday: IOB (Chennai) 75 (P. Jeevanantham 21, Prasanna Venkatesh 15, Vineeth Ravi Mathew 10) bt Indian Navy (Lonavala) 64 (Amal 14, Kamal 15); Indian Air Force (Delhi) 76 (Nikil 23, Narendar Grewal 19) bt CRPF 60.
Women (CRI Trophy): KSEB 42 (G. Roja Mol 11, Nimmy Mathew 10) bt North Frontier Railway 32 (Jonali Dutta 10) .
