WORCESTER Wolves produced a third-quarter rampage to beat Teesside Lions 85-67 and maintain their place at the top of National Basketball League Division One.
Although Wolves eventually secured a comfortable margin of victory, they had to recover from an early deficit in order to overcome their North-East hosts.
Teesside’s Miles Felletti-O’Donnell had the hot hand in the opening stages, contributing 11 points towards his side’s 24-20 first-quarter advantage.
The second period commenced with the British guard setting his feet to float home his third three-pointer and extend the Lions lead to 27-20.
However, Worcester playmaker Harry Godwin was impeded on successive drives to the hoop and then sank all of the resultant free throws.
And he evaded defenders on his next weave forward to close the gap to 33-31, six minutes ahead of half-time.
And Wolves duo Humberto Ferreira and Earl Burgess soon found their groove to edge the visitors in front.
When a Wilfrid Santhe long-distance shot went astray, both players leapt highest, taking turns at tip-back attempts before Burgess succeeded, pushing Worcester into a 44-40 interval lead.
Having watched Teesside sink seven first-half triples while his own team remained scoreless after five misses, Santhe finally got a perimeter-shot to drop three minutes after the break.
A few moments later Emmanuel Yeboah did likewise to extend the advantage to 54-46.
And Worcester then harassed Felletti-O’Donnell to turn the ball over on consecutive possessions with Wolves suddenly 59-46 to the good.
Yeboah dunked after dispossessing his demoralised opponent and an overpowering 25-11 surge accelerated Worcester into the distance.
Though already dominating 69-51 as the last quarter began, there was little let-up in Teesside’s torment.
Ferreira provided a double of steals, the second of which preceded a Burgess alley-oop slam, Godwin twice pulled up for triples and Santhe iced the win with another three-pointer.
Ferreira and Burgess led the scoring with 20 and 19 points respectively. Santhe supplied 15 points and Godwin chipped in a dozen.
Wolves take to the road again on Saturday, February 7, visiting Liverpool for a 3pm tip-off.
