Defeating Cantho Catfish at home, Hanoi Buffaloes closes the earliest Playoffs slot VBA 2023
Although there was a surprise in the starting lineup when the Hanoi Buffaloes put Anthony January on the bench, the result of the match between the "Thu Do" and the away team Cantho Catfish was not surprising.
Meeting on the evening of August 12 at Hoang Mai Stadium, Hanoi Buffaloes can close the VBA Playoffs at the earliest in the 2023 season with a win. Their opponent is Cantho Catfish, a team that is in a rather volatile form in recent times.
Buffaloes today did not have the service of Dinh Tien Cong when this internal soldier was suspended for one match, and the Capital team also kept foreign soldier Anthony January on the bench. Even so, the Buffaloes are still the ones in control of the game better.
After two struggling rounds with the commendable individual efforts of the trio of Joshua Keyes, Brachon Griffin and Michael Soy on the Cantho Catfish side, the Hoang Mai Stadium team played a comprehensive attack and defense to create the biggest difference at times. to 20 points in the second half.
Besides the two familiar locomotives, Udun Osakue and Anthony January, the Buffaloes had a round-robin match of Tam Dinh and Nguyen Tien Duong on the scoring front. Defensively, the home team pressed Cantho Catfish to 20 ball errors, thereby bringing in another 29 points from these turnovers to create an advantage.
With the unimpressive performance of most of the team, Cantho Catfish was unable to make a comeback. The final victory with the score of 95-81 belonged to Hanoi Buffaloes, helping "the Capital Buffalo" to close the first Playoffs of VBA 2023.
Despite coming on as a substitute, Anthony January still won the Player of The Game title with 29 points (13-31 FG) along with 20 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 blocks. Behind him is Udun Osakue, the owner of the "triple-double missed" with 20 points, 12 rebounds and 9 assists.
Dinh Thanh Tam and Nguyen Tien Duong each scored 12 points. Internal soldier Vu Viet Hoang achieved a 100% rate from outside the round of 3 points, ending the game with 8 points, 3 rebounds and 2 steals.
On the Cantho Catfish side, Joshua Keyes scored 25 points with 10 rebounds, 4 assists and 6 blocks. Brachon Griffin scored 20 points with 8 rebounds and 7 assists.
Michael Soy continued the series of long throws quite well with 23 points (5-11 3PT) and added 5 assists. Unfortunately for Catfish, apart from this trio, no player contributed more than 5 points in the match.
In the next outing, Hanoi Buffaloes will be the guest of Danang Dragons at Son Tra district powerhouse at 19:30 pm on August 15. With Cantho Catfish, they will return to their home ground and welcome the "dragon of the Han River" on the evening of August 18.
