Star of the Sea's attempt to regain the league title suffered another major setback last night as they lost 93-90 after a stormy conclusion to their Superleague basketball game away to Killester.
Star led 51-39 at half-time but were outplayed in the third quarter after which the Dubliners led 63-62. Star edged back in front near the end of the game and with 12 seconds remaining they were 9089 ahead when their American Ryan Howse was controversially called for goal-tending on a Mike Trimmer shot for Killester. Killester were awarded the two points and the subsequent protests by Star were punished by a technical foul which gave Trimmer two free throws which he converted to secure a three-point winning margin.
Star will undergo further severe examination when they travel to play Blue Demons in Gurranabraher on Sunday in a rematch of their dramatic cup semifinal a fortnight ago.
On that occasion, Demons came from 13 points down to snatch victory with a controversially awarded free-throw by Francisco de Benito in the final two seconds.
The narrowly defeated cup finalists, Demons, have one injury worry ahead of the game as prolific scoring American, Dion Wingfield, has a niggling knee problem.
The quirky and at times confusing points system used by the Irish Basketball Association in the current national league campaign gives a somewhat inaccurate impression of just which team is best placed to win the title.
While Star lead the table, they have in fact lost more games than second placed Waterford, who can overtake the Belfast club should they win their game in hand.
In effect, Waterford are in the best position to win the title and are expected to continue their unbeaten record in 1999 as they play host tomorrow to Dublin Bay Vikings, who have had a dismal season since jointly leading the campaign with Waterford early on.
At the foot of the table it looks as though the bottom club, Tolka Rovers, will be weakened further by the loss of American Sean Scott - who has returned to the US - for their visit to Dungannon tomorrow.
Meanwhile, another team struggling in the bottom third of the table, Sligo, look to have been strengthened by the arrival of two Spaniards who were inspired to join the North West club near where they are working after watching their fellow countryman, Francisco de Benito, play for Demons in the cup play-off recently.
The 6ft 4in Enrique Rodrigues and 6ft 6in Jorge Berges are reported to have played Division Two basketball in Spain and both have been added to the Sligo squad for the televised game against Limerick at the National Arena in Tallaght tomorrow evening.
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/irishtimes/YVIRIOZQ35EWRPZXR27KGMO6YU.png)