Templeogue squeaked past Pyrobel Killester and into the Hula Hoops Men’s National Cup final for the first time with a 61-59 win at the Mardyke Arena.
Killester led from the eighth to the 38th minute of a low-scoring game but Templeogue eventually reeled in an 11 point lead to win by a basket.
“You could see we were tired at the end of the game," said Templeogue coach Mark Keenan, who has won this competition in the past with both Killester and UL Eagles.
“Killester were tired too. It was that kind of game. I’m just delighted we were able to pull it out at the finish.”
Killester opted to shoot for three and win the game with the last shot of the game, but Jermaine Turner’s effort fell short. Moments beforehand, Keith Anderson thought he had levelled the scores at 60-60 before he was adjudged to have put a foot on the line when shooting from the same distance.
Templeogue drew level, fighting t their way back into the game with Jason Killeen matching Jermaine Turner for rebounding. It was the Limerick man’s reverse layup that drew the sides level before Stephen James hit a deep two with 90 seconds left to give pulling down more rebounds and stepped up with Lorcan Murphy and Stephen James to make big shots down the stretch.
“They had us on the ropes in the first half,” said Killeen.
"We’ve won a lot of close games this year and I think it’s really stood to us. They had us on the ropes in the first half but we spoke about cleaning up defensively and we just pulled it together.”
Killester looked every inch the winning side for the majority of the game. Ciaran Roe had shaken off a viral infection to run distribution with Jermaine Turner imposing himself and Paul Dick combining with Keith Anderson to keep Templeogue at bay for 30 minutes.
The win looked closer still when Dick landed a triple and then went coast-to-coast to make it 57-51 with 5:30 left on the clock. Killester were six clear at that stage but only managed one more basket in the remainder.
