Southern rally to down Maharashtra for women's title

Southern Railway, Chennai staged a splendid second-half fight back to down a spirited Maharashtra 67-62 to win the women's title in the UPL 9th Savio Cup All India Basketball tournament here today.
Southern women trailed the host state girls 19-33 at half time before recovering brilliantly to level the score at 51 in the last quarter.
Both teams started off on an unimpressive note and missed some easy lay-ups. But Maharashtra proved to be a little bit better as they managed to converted some of the chances that came their way to take a 13-9 lead at the end of the first quarter.

They maintained the tempo in the next to finish the first half with a healthy 33-19 lead.
After switching ends, Southern made a determined fight back and cut down the difference in the third quarter to just four points with Maharashtra in the lead at 49-45.
The final last 10 minutes was a nail-biting affair as the scores ran neck-and-neck, before the Chennai girls held their nerves to clinch the issue in their favour.

Though Maharashtra clung on and led 59-56 with two minutes left on the clock, the Railway women again drew level at 60 and then went in front with two free throws from Apoorva Muralinath who top scored with 19 and held on to win by five points.

Apart from Apoorva, who converted 13 out of 16 free throws to star in the Railways' turn around, Priyadarshini Raja and Soniya Joy contributed 15 each.
For Maharashtra, skipper Manisha Dange led with a superb display in which she scored 30 points and got good support from Shireen Limaye (13) and play maker Renu Maurya who kept her team in the fight with three-pointers after Southern drew level for the first time.
The scores were level at 60 with one and half minutes left on the clock, but Southern - who stepped up the pace towards the end - went ahead through free throws converted by Apoorva and Soniya.