Delhi boys beat Tamil Nadu in their semifinal in the 64th Junior National Basketball Championship here Saturday.
With 10 lead changes and scores getting tied seven times, it was anybody's game. After repeatedly drawing within one point of Delhi, Tamil Nadu in the fourth quarter committed hara-kiri in the penultimate minute of the game. Delhi, featuring five India internationals, took full advantage to score a brisk 10 points to win 92-75.
Earlier, Chhattisgarh girls led by centre Poonam Chaturvedi snuffed out any hopes that Tamil Nadu may have harboured of pulling off a win. Chhattisgarh had already comprehensively beaten Tamil Nadu earlier in the league stage.
Chhattisgarh's Poonam regularly scored more than half of her team's points. In the semifinal, she came up with her highest score of the tournament with 67 points, bettering her previous mark of 63 against the same opponents. Her teammates did well to selflessly feed her the ball under the basket.
Chhattisgarh will look to repeat the same in the final where they face Kerala, who overcame Maharashtra to book their spot in the championship match.
