Basketball: Fired-up Blaze unable to prevent Kings from taking yet another crown

Edinburgh KINGS added another trophy to the season's collection when they beat Boroughmuir Blaze 58-43 in the Lothian Cup final at Portobello High School on Saturday.

Down ten points after the first quarter (9-19) and still behind at half-time (24-31), Blaze stormed back to take the lead and were 41-40 up after the third with Gregor Auld, Simon Ferrieman and John Brown prominent in a fine team effort.

An injury to Brown may well have been the turning point as the Stevenson College point guard took no further part.

Kings, who beat Aberdeen University in the Scottish Chairman's Cup final last weekend, re-exerted full control in the final quarter with Mike Murray making several steals on his way to a 19-point top score and point guard Craig Reilly adding 15 and Chris McBrierty nine.

Auld and Ferrieman both had 14 for Blaze and Brown 12.

Polonia Phoenix, like Kings, made it a Scottish Chairman's/Lothian Cup double for coach Laura Bald by defeating Midlothian Saints 54-38 in the women's final. Meanwhile, Capital stars Michael Kirkpatrick and Tom Hutchinson were prominent for coach Iain Maclean's Scottish Universities men in Stirling at the weekend, beating Stirling Knights 73-56 and the Scottish Under-23s 78-48.