GB Wheelchair Basketball Team Get Gold At Paralympic World Cup
The Great Britain men’s wheelchair basketball team clinched Paralympic World Cup gold after a 53-42 win over Canada in Manchester.
GB had beaten Canada 66-44 in their pool game earlier in the week and after pulling ahead late in the first quarter, never looked back.
Jon Pollock top scored with 17 points, with 12 from Ian Sagar, who also managed 11 rebounds.
The GB women missed out on bronze after losing 59-24 to Australia.
Sagar and Pollock were among four players rested for Saturday’s final round-robin game against Australia by coach Murray Treseder.
But they returned to the starting line-up against Canada alongside Abdi Jama and Simon Munn.
Sagar scored seven points in the opening quarter as Britain took a 14-10 lead.
The advantage was doubled to eight by the half-time interval, with Pollock successful with two three-point attempts.
Ade Orogbemi converted a fast break on the buzzer at the end of the third period to establish a 13-point lead ahead of the final 10 minutes.
David Eng hit two three-pointers in the closing seconds for Canada, but it was not enough as GB gave their hopes of success in July’s World Championships in Birmingham a boost.
But Pollock, who was part of the GB team that won bronze at the Beijing Paralympics, refused to get carried away after the win.
“All this is to me is that we’re en route to what we need to achieve further down the line,” he said.
“This is just a box ticked. It’s a confidence boost.
“We knew today was going to be a challenging game, but at the end of the day we were just a little bit better.”
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