COACH PJ A WORD FROM

Welcome to today’s game against Champions elect as we battle against the London Lions.

London, who have already put the BBL Cup in their trophy cabinet and unsurprisingly also look set to claim the BBL Championship with games in hand.

I’ve said it before and I’ll keep saying it, this London team is the strongest and best team that has ever been assembled in the BBL. They are packed with great talent in every position and play a style of basketball that is great to watch.

London Lions have set the bar high this season and that’s great for the British game. The standards they are setting is getting the BBL talked about more than ever before and the exposure for the league and teams is only going to get more and more talented players wanting to play in the BBL.

A lot of this additional attention on the BBL comes down to how well London have been doing in the 7Days Eurocup and long may their success continue as that will benefit us all in the long run.

After another mini break in our season, you will know and see a couple of new faces in our roster in Ralph Bissainthe (RB), and Otas Iyekekpolor (O). As always, I know you will give them a big Patriots welcome.

We have only had a week to work with them and the rest of the team, so we must be patient as we try and get them fully up to speed with what we want and need from them as a team. The signs have been good and were looking forward to the remainder of the season as we try to make a real play-off push.

Integrating players part way through a season as we have seen is tough, but if it’s not right it needs to be fixed and hopefully, we have done that with these two additions.

I think it’s going to be an exciting end to the season with still so many things that could happen between now and then.

We must be ready to do battle with the London Lions this afternoon and show fight, grit, toughness, and great determination!!!

A warm welcome to the coaching staff, players, and support teams from the Lions for these BBL championship game.