Bank of Taiwan cashes in on slumping Beer

Shooting Wu Yung-ren (吳永仁) and power forward Yang Ching-ming (楊敬敏) each drained four three pointers in Bank of Taiwan's upset 81-88 victory over Taiwan Beer on Saturday night. The win snapped the Bank's 11-game losing streak and gave the team its first taste of victory since last December.

In a rare offensive blitz, Bank of Taiwan put up 52 points in the first half and joined the Yulon Dinos and the BCC Mars as the only teams in the league to break the half-century scoring mark in a half. Bank of Taiwan shot an incredible 42 percent from the floor to better their previous best by 7 percent.

The defense also did its job in containing Taiwan Beer's Lin "the Monster" Chih-jeh (林志傑) late in the game by forcing Lin to alter his shots several times and commit crucial turnovers.

"I am glad we won this one," Bank of Taiwan head coach Wei Chen-ming (韋陳明) said after his team's victory. "But what impressed me even more is the way we maintained our focus and stuck together as a team to fight until the very end."

Lions 60, Tigers 89

Upsets the main theme of the weekend's action because the Dacin Tigers pulled off an enormous upset against the previously red-hot Sina Lions to end the Lions' winning streak at a dozen. Tien Lei (田壘) netted 23 points along with 24 rebounds as the mighty Tigers preyed on the helpless Lions.

Playing if an invisible lid was covering the basket, the Lions scored a record-low four points in the third quarter. Known for their deadly shooting from beyond the three-point line, the Lions came up empty in all but two of their 23 three-point attempts.

Dinos 67, Elephants 79

The Jeoutai Elephants took no prisoners in Sunday's afternoon match against the Dinos to go 2-1 against the Dinos this season. The Elephants showed the rest of the league that their victory over the Dinos the first time was no fluke, even though the more-than 1,500 Dino fans on hand would argue otherwise.

The fans could be right because the Dinos did not have the service of lead scorer Chen Hsin-an (陳信安) due to a 12-day military service obligation. Chen's season average of 17.7 points per game would have been plenty to put the Dinos over the edge against the Elephants.

Veteran Yang Yu-ming (楊玉明) did not have a good day from behind the three-point line (1-for-6), but the Elephants' scoring threat still managed to lead all scorers with 20 points.

An rally by the Dinos reduced the 13-point half-time lead by the Elephants to as few as four with nearly three-and-a-half minutes left to play, but that was as close as the Dinos got because the Elephants then went on a 11-3 run to nail the win.

Lions 70, Mars 74

Liu Yi-shiang's (劉義祥) technical foul with some two minutes left might have cost his team the game in the Lions' four-point loss to the Mars on Sunday night. The 202cm veteran lost his cool in arguing a questionable call that gave the Mars a free-throw opportunity and the ball in a three-point swing.

That was all the Mars needed to send the Lions to their second straight defeat in as many games. The league's stingiest defense that had yielded only 68.1 points per game prior to last weekend gave up a combined 163 points in the two losses.