Regular season play in the Super Basketball League came to an end on Sunday with the Yulon Dinos taking the season finale against the Dacin Tigers in an 87-83 decision at the Taipei Physical Education College Gymnasium.
The defending champs ended with a league-best record of 24-6, taking an eight-game winning streak into the upcoming postseason, which begins on Friday.
Sunday's match began with the Dinos overcoming a shaky start to finish the opening quarter with a 24-23 lead.
Then came a furious 10-2 run by the Tigers that helped them regain a brief lead, only to see the Dinos counter with an 18-point run to close out the first half leading by a dozen (50-38).
The Tigers managed to chip away at the Dinos lead with a sound perimeter attack that drained four 3-pointers in the third quarter to come within four of the Dinos late in the quarter.
A resilient Dinos squad held off a Tigers rally in the fourth quarter to preserve the win.
All-Star Tseng Wen-ding and Chou Shih-yuan each had 18 points to lead a balanced Dinos offense that placed four players in double-digit scoring.
Tigers icon Tien Lei achieved a game-high 36 points and 19 rebounds, as the cats head into the playoffs on the heals of a three-game losing skid.
Taiwan Beer 89, YMY 88
Taiwan Beer edged the 3-26 YMY 89-88 to beat out the Tigers for a second-place finish with a regular season record of 20-10.
The victory came with a scare, as the brewers' leading scorer, Lin "The Beast" Chih-jeh, went down hard in what appeared to be a serious-looking ankle injury that has since been reported as "moderate" following X-rays that indicated that there were no breaks.
Behind second-year guard Wu Guan-luen's 10 first-quarter points, the brew crew was able to jump to an early 25-20 lead after the opening quarter.
But veteran point guard Luo "The Natural" Hsin-liang, with a incredible 25-point first half, kept YMY in the game as they ended the evenly fought first half down by just four.
An eventful third quarter, highlighted by Lin's departure from the game with under four minutes to play, breathed new life into YMY as they finished out the quarter with an 11-3 run to keep pace with Taiwan Beer.
The young YMY squad led with less than three minutes remaining in the fourth quarter before the brewers responded with five unanswered points to take an 88-all tie down the wire.
It took a clutch free throw by Wu in the game's closing seconds to break the tie and put the brewers up for good.
Five different Taiwan Beer players scored in double-figures, with Wu leading the pack on a 20-point night.
Luo led YMY shooters with 36 points.
NBA
Luol Deng scored 17 of his 26 points to spearhead Chicago's first-half rally from an early 15-point deficit, and the Bulls also got 18 points apiece from Andres Nocioni and Ben Gordon to beat the Miami Heat 117-93 Sunday and clinch an NBA Eastern Conference postseason berth.
Chicago's win not only spoiled Miami's home finale, it eliminated any hope Orlando had of sneaking onto the East's playoff bracket.
Antoine Walker had 22 points and O'Neal added 14 in 20 minutes for Miami. Wade had only eight points on 2-for-12 shooting in 20 minutes, ending his team-record streak of 78 straight games in double figures.
Spurs 103, Timberwolves 90
In Minneapolis, San Antonio moved closer to clinching first place in the Western Conference behind 57 points from its backups.
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