Squads regroup for New Year drive

It's not even finished yet, but the opening season of the Super Basketball League has already proved one thing -- it's tough at the bottom.

With the Yulon Dinos (11-0) and the red-hot Sina Lions (on a 7-0 unbeaten streak) tearing up the top of the table, the rest of the division is having a difficult time trying to cling on to their coat tails.

But in a league that is clearly divided into two, the BCC Mars and the Dacin Tigers are the teams that have the best chance of any kind of post-season play outside of the top two.

After starting the season with a bang (4-2), the BCC Mars fell behind after injuries took their toll and prevented coach Chung Chih-mong (鍾枝萌) from putting out a full-strength squad.

The team's overall success hinges on the health of point guard Yen Hsin-shu (顏行書), whose ability to see the entire floor, especially in the Mars' transition game, will determine whether this team will be figure in the post season.

Yen's effectiveness in penetrating the defense should also lead to some easy baskets down below for Mars' big men when he is not sinking three-pointers.

As much as the Mars need a healthy Yen, their dependence on him pales in comparison to the Tigers' reliance on all-star forward Tien Lei (田壘), whose 246 points and 122 rebounds account for approximately a third of the Tigers' total in each category (793 points and 385 rebounds) so far.

Tien is the only player in the league with a double-double average (22.4 points per game and 11.1 rebounds per game), something that should draw him double coverage for the remainder of the season.

The two sub-par games experienced by Taiwan Beer's Lin "The Monster" Chih-jeh (林志傑), where his scoring total fell by nearly 50 percent (from 23 points to just 12), are precisely what could happen to Tien as opposing teams come up with various ways to shut down one-man shows.

Without Lin's extra 12 points, the Beer men are winless in their last three contests, which is why coach Fu Ming-ren (傅明仁) must quickly find a way to increase the offensive output from his frontcourt players -- Liao Wei-cheng (廖偉成) and Pan Ren-deh (潘仁德).

Inconsistency has been the No. 1 concern for Jeoutai Elephant skipper Liu Hua-lin (劉華林) in the first half of the season as his team mixed in eight losses with two big wins over the Tigers and Taiwan Beer to climb off the bottom of the league.

"There is no doubt that the Elephants can play with anyone when they have their `A' game on," one senior league official said on condition of anonymity. "They definitely have all the key factors for a great team in shooter Yang Yu-ming (楊玉明) and the `twin towers' of Wu Dai-hao (吳岱豪) and Ha Hsiao-yuan (哈孝遠)."

The Elephants need to control the tempo of the game and maintain their offensive flow. They currently lead the league in turnovers committed with 204, 25 more than the next in line.

Most of the turnovers have come as the result of rushing the game too much. Once the team manages to control the tempo of the game, the offensive flow should follow naturally.

At 2-8, Bank of Taiwan finds itself with the most room for improvement.

On defense, the financial wizards actually deserve applause for yielding fewer points (77.1 on average) than the Mars (79.1) and Taiwan Beer (78.4). It is their last-placed scoring offense (70.4 on average) that has kept coach Wei Chen-ming (韋陳明) awake at night.