Al Rayyan add to Kuwait Club's struggles in skid-snapping win

DOHA (Qatar) - Al Rayyan stunned Kuwait Club at home, 94-90, to finally lay their harrowing three-game losing skid to rest in the FIBA West Asia Super League (WASL) Season 2, Monday night at the Al-Gharafa Sports Club Multi-Purpose Hall in the Qatari capital.

Andrew White III led the way with 24 points, none bigger than the three-pointer he banked in with 33.0 seconds left to play to strike the dagger right into the chest of the reigning Gulf League champions, which have now lost their second game in a row.

The youth-laden squad improved to 2-3 after dragging their more experienced foes to 3-2, enabling Muharraq to take the provisional lead in Group A as they tote a 3-1 card.

Game heroes: Nick Griffin was instrumental as well. He finished with 21 points on five triples, including four straight, to lead Al Rayyan's 29-point second-quarter breakaway.

Veteran forward Mouhammad Faye supplied 12 points, 6 rebounds, and 5 assists. Mohamed Abdelaziz also made 12 points while Malek Salem Abdulla added 10 in the win that showed how much they've learned from that 19-point collapse againt Al Ahli Jeddah.

Turning point: Al Rayyan pulled away in the second chapter to head into the break with a commanding 52-36 lead and even led by as many as 21, but Kuwait Club crawled back.

They got to within four behind the efforts of Tony Carr but White II was there to spoil their plans, sinking a big triple to push the home team's lead to seven, 91-84.

The visiting team still tried to put up a fight by freezing the clock, but Al Rayyan provided apt responses, calmly sinking their free throws to keep the opposition at bay.

Stats don't lie: Al Rayyan committed only 6 turnovers in the triumph, which are the fewest committed by any FIBA WASL team this season.

They said: "What was very important in this game was we started focused and we stayed focused on all the details. We talked about what's important. What we needed to do, we did very well from the beginning all the way to the end. When the game got close, we had a very important three from Aziz and controlled some rebounds and we made all the free throws we needed to make." - Stergious Koufus, Head Coach, Al Rayyan

"Yeah. It definitely was a lesson. It was a tough loss, being up 15-plus points and losing all that in one quarter basically, but day-by-day we've been working very hard to come back from that loss." - Nick Griffin, Al Rayyan

"We're really not worried about where we finish -- we shouldn't be where we finish -- we should worry a lot more about how we play basketball. Because if we continue playing like this, we're not gonna get anywhere. Our focus is gonna be to get it back together as a team to where we can be, and then we'll be fine." - Peter Schomers, Head Coach, Kuwait Club

"They made a tough shot off the backboard, at the end of the shot clock. We were closing in on them. They got good players and they played well. They got the best of us today." - Tony Carr, Kuwait Club

FIBA