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G League Austin Spurs

Flyers soar over Toros to clinch regular season championship

April 1, 2006 - NBA G League (G League)
Austin Spurs News Release


Austin, TEXAS - With two weeks left in the D-League regular season, the Fort Worth Flyers clinched the D-League regular season title and home court advantage throughout postseason play with a 98-80 win over the Austin Toros in front of 2,647 in attendance at the Convention Center.

Keith Langford led the Flyers (27-16) with a game-high 23 points on 8-of-12 shooting. Kelenna Azubuike added 20 points while Nbudi Ebi chipped in with 12 points and 12 rebounds.

Jamar Smith paced Austin (23-23) with 19 points and ten rebounds, while Scott Merritt added 17 points and nine rebounds. Austin guard Derrick Zimmerman, who was recently named as the D-League's Defensive Player of the Year, finished with three steals, three points, five assists and seven rebounds.

"This is an incredibly good feeling to reach this point and clinch a regular season championship when we have worked as hard as we did throughout the season," said Fort Worth head coach Sam Vincent. "When you are playing in a really tough league, with good coaches, it is gratifying to see the reward of your hard work. I am really proud of our guys."

What ended up as an easy win for the first-place Flyers was not without adversity in the fourth quarter. After building a 22-point lead in the second quarter, the Toros pull to the score to within four points heading into the fourth quarter. But with the Austin tank on empty from making the come-from-behind push in the third quarter, the Flyers opened the fourth quarter with a 17-4 run to deflate any hopes of late Toro rally.

"We did well to get back into the game in the third quarter," said Toros head coach Dennis Johnson. "But we used up a lot of energy trying to cut into their lead. The intensity that we showed in the third quarter is the type of intensity we needed from the very start."

"We did relax a little in the third quarter with the big league," Vincent said. "But, when our guys needed to step up and perform, I thought they did a wonderful job of that in the fourth."

Austin turned a blowout into a close game in the third quarter. After being outplayed in the first half, the Toros outscored Fort Worth 29-16 in the third quarter to trim a 17-point halftime deficit to just four points (73-69) heading into the fourth quarter. Andre Emmett and Smith were pivotal during the Toros' comeback run combining for 20 points (ten each) in the third quarter.

Fort Worth got off to a quick start scoring the first eight points of the game. Austin ended the Flyers scoring run with basket by Merrit three minutes into the game, but would be held scoreless for the next five minutes as Fort Worth put together another run. This 10-0 run by the Flyers would open their lead to 18-2 just seven minutes into the game.

Austin finally got off the snide knocking down back-to-back baskets by Merrit and Omar Thomas with a little less than three minutes left in the quarter, but couldn't get much more production ending the quarter with just ten points while shooting 23.5 percent (4-for-17) from the field.

Austin fought back into the game in the second quarter getting solid bench production from Thomas and Williams. The duo combined to score 15 first quarter points to help Austin pull to within 11 points at 30-19 with a little more than eight minutes before the half. Fort Worth answered the Toros' surge scoring six of the last eight points in the half to take a 57-40 lead into the half. Fort Worth shot a blistering 58.1 percent (25-for-43) in the first half.

The Toros and Flyers will meet again tomorrow beginning at 3 p.m. at the Convention Center.

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