picture of the day

This time round, the picture of the day wasn't of my own work. It's from NBA.com. I thought it's interesting, so decided to share it here.

Touch of midas. The angle looks as though Derek Fisher (left) has his hand on Tony Parker's (right) head as they faced of in the NBA Western Conference Final.

Story behind the picture:
LA Lakers played against the defending champion San Antonio Spurs in the Western Conference Final yesterday. The Spurs managed to silence the league's MVP Kobe Bryant, of LA Lakers, by holding him to only 2 points in the first half. Then the LA Lakers superstar broke loose to unleash a classical act to score 25 points in the second half, rallying his team from a 20-point deficit to beat the Spurs 89 - 85.

basketball tournament - kuching open final iii.

Okay here's the final post on basketball, and sports, at least for a while. LOL.

The previous post was so much about the #15 dude, so I'll try not to highlight him that much in this one.

The whole game was pretty good. Action-filled, and it's really worth watching.

The #15 dude.

Sarawak Energy wasn't the only team who brought in 'imports', Sentosa had their very own import too. They have an imported player in their #8, I forgot his name. He's based in Miri, and represented Malaysia in the junior level, if not mistaken. He's pretty tall at height.

Import vs Import.

Look at his height against the #15 dude. Almost the same, no? This dude could dunk as well. But too bad, I didn't get to see him dunk. Hmm. I was out of luck, I guess. So how good was the actual game? Well, if you ask me, I'll definitely say it's much better than KungFu Dunk. (I dislike that dude in the movie).

The Kungfu element in the game, flying kick? LOL, not quite.

I'd rather watch this game on tape over and over again, than watching that movie. The movie was really a crap.

I think I should make myself a pass, so that I can get a courtside access to cover such event. LOL. Then again, it's not right to do so.

Where's the ball? LOL. Can see?

So, who walked away as the winner?

A little bit of input about basketball game in general before I end this post. Apart from NBA, and NCAA, the two I know of, basketball games are played with the standard regulation set by FIBA, so there should be much different anywhere else.

A basketball game is played through four quarters, two for each half, and each quarter lasts for 10 minutes. Should the game ends in a tie in score, overtime period will be played. I think the overtime period lasts for 5 minutes. During the game, teams must make a shot attempt within the given 24 seconds time frame, this is known as the shot clock. Should any team fails to make shot attempt when shot-clock expires, the possession will go to the opposing team.

LOL. Now I think that is boring enough. Okay. Let's just end this post already.

After teams exchanging shots...

.. like this 3 pointer.

And arguing about referee's calls...

.. like this.

.. or maybe like this.

So, after exciting four quarters of play, we finally have a winner from the two. And the winner is...

... Sarawak Energy!!!

I'm sure Sentosa will return next time as a stronger team.

I think we should have more of such competition going around. It's good for the sports, for the people, and of course, good for the nation. Since it's so good, why don't we form a properly managed league?

Well, my only complain for the day was the stadium and its surrounding. The stadium is pretty old already. I think the planning wasn't wisely done back then when they build for this stadium. The recreational park there was poorly maintained.

Otherwise, the surrounding could be a nicer place than it is now.


Photo notes: All photos posted in the finals are taken with EF 90-300 lens. Photos had to be cropped to 'save' the composition. Flash wasn't used, because if it's used, the photos will look ugly.

basketball tournament - kuching open final ii.

So the game tipped off, and we were into the finals between Sarawak Energy and Sentosa.

Sometime after the game started, I spotted this by the courtsie. A reporter was covering the game. He's Michael.

I spotted something, but I had to zoom till max length of 300mm to be sure. I saw siao bai!

The game was pretty exciting, both teams exchanged basket constantly. That made the score pretty close, through the first quarter, and much into the second. Sarawak Energy seemed to have bit of edge over their opponents, as Sentosa constantly attempt long range shot beyond the arch. For some reasons, the Sentosa players were less cool about the match, probably stil hyped to be where they had reach then.

#15 tried to slash towards the basket, constantly threatening the opponents' defense.

The #15 dude (this sound so amateur-like, but I seriously don't know what his name is) is a all-around player. Not only he can penetrates from perimeter, play in the box, he can also square up a three pointer in your face. According to the article I read in Sin Chew Daily, his natural position is guard, but he has to make shift to play as a Power Forward cos lack of size in his team.

Triple ball!

Hack-a-Shaq strategy surely doesn't work on him, he hits stroke in his free throws!

For some reason, the crowd cheered whenever the #15 dude touched the ball. It somehow became a 'homecourt' advantage for Sarawak Energy. I guess the crowd was expecting the #15 dude to put on a showcase.

Sentosa piled defense onto #15, resorting all kinds of methods to stop him.

Well, I guess expectations are there when he put up few dunks before the final. I was expecting a dunk the very least. But too bad, there wasn't any. It seems as though the star of attraction laid low, and was deployed as a decoy. When he drew attention from the defense, there is high chance for his other team-mate to be unguarded. Thus, easy offense for his team.

"Not in my house!"

Offense wasn't only his highlight, he also served up top class defense, including the block in the picture above. I thought we'd only get to see this kind of block in the NBA. Hmm.. I wish I could leap that high and block a shot consistently. I must lose my weight first.

High above the rest.

That's all for this part, final round up will follow next.

basketball tournament - kuching open final i.

I will try to do a quick posts on this part. Let's get it done and dusted quickly so that we can move on to other things.

Kuching Open Basketball Tournament.

I posted the update on semi-finals. Now that you have seen how it was like in the semi, how do you think the final game will turn out to be like?

Well, first major differences was dealt at the door. Throughout the tournament, at least until semi-finals, there wasn't any entrance fee charged. But, it's all different when it comes to the finals. We were charged about MYR 5 per adult, and MYR 3 for children (if not mistaken).

Despite the entrance fee, people are still flocking in the stadium for the final match day of the tournament. We had hard time finding parking for our vehicles.

The finalists were Sarawak Energy and Sentosa. These two met at the same stage last year, with Sarawak Energy as the beaten finalist, as Sentosa walked away with the champion's trophy. This time round, Sarawak Energy reinforced with new acquisition, an foreign player in the #15 Cameroonian, and player #12 who is of Labuan origin.

A battle with vengeance, I guess.

So, let's have a preview on what serves up next in the game's detail.

Former gem of Sarawak, Lau Boon Hui, he was pretty popular back then, one of the best guard in the nation. Believe it or not, he could dunk, despite his not-so-impressive height.

The man from Cameroon, the foreign import. He gave a lot of highlight-reels and a lot for the fans to cheer about throughout the tournament.

The Sentosa team in blue jersey.

Out for the ball.

So who will win the game, and how did they win it?

They'll be up next.

basketball - kuching open semi-final

Since my last few posts have been sports related, why not make it a series. I hope it doesn't bore the girls out there. At least, you can have your eye candy in Cristiano Ronaldo, right?

This time round, I am not going to the States for NBA, nor I am going to Europe to talk about the football there. I'm going local this time.

I was at Kuching Open Tournament Semi-Finals, which just concluded recently on the 4th of May.

There were two semi-final match scheduled on Friday, but I only managed to catch the second one. I was at other location earlier, as there was a charity concert on the same day. Will post some of the photos from the other event later on.

Kuching Open Tournament was held in MBKS Indoor Stadium, which is located at Pending there. This stadium has been around for quite a while already. The building itself is quite old, and the recreation park, which was built just near the stadium, lacks maintenance. The whole place just look worn down.

Anyways, back to the semi-finals. The first semi-final featured Sarawak Energy, or more keenly known as SESCo, who are one of the two hot favorites to win the tourney. The second game featured the other favorite - Sentosa.

Again, I put my 350D to the test this time. I must say, the angle wasn't great, as I just snapped the shots from the audience stand. The lens I use most of the time was my 50mm f/1.8. Other settings include shutter speed between 1/320 - 1/200, and ISO at 800.

Empty stadium, even no entrance fee was charged, the stadium was rather empty.

We're going to look more into the actions from that night.

Local hoop action.

3-point attempt.

A 3-point attempt.

A break away layup.

A Sentosa player (#7) with a jump-shot attempt.

Free shots, free throw.

The shots here aren't dramatic. Hmm. I wish I could just shoot from court side. I could just be thick-face and wonder around the court side snapping happily there, but then, I don't want to end up being escorted away by security personnel.

Hmm. How nice if I can shoot with a EF 70-200mm f/2.8 IS, preferably with at least a 40D body, if not 5D.

LOL. I'm dreaming!

The final match coming up next. I might need to split the next post to multiple part, cos I took quite a plenty shots that night. We'll see how it goes.

my new kicks

Early this month, I bought me a pair of new kicks from the Lea Center's clearances sales. All products were offered at 50% discount storewide.

Since my Nike was showing signs of giving up on me already, I thought it was a good time to get myself a new pair. I love my Nike. It serves me well, for more than three years. The condition is still okay, just that the grip, or aka brake, is wearing out.

I was so into basketball shoes when I was much younger, but now, I just simply get a good pair, good enough for me to enjoy my weekly dose of basketball. I don't even what model I bought.

All I know it's a adidas. After discount, this pair cost me about MYR 184.95. Normal price would be at MYR 369.90.

I wore this to basketball last Monday, it's a bit tight at the mid-sole area. Other than that it was just fine. The shoes were the same size as my previous shoes. So, there wasn't much problem when I tried it out at the store. I only felt the tightness after some running on the court. I almost got myself blisters on my right foot after the game.

It'll be Monday again soon, and that means ball time!