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ROCKETS REACH CUP FINAL!
Saturday August 31, 2013
Despite enduring an injury-racked 2013, the Silver Ski Rockets will get a final shot at silverware courtesy of the Knock-Out Cup. The Rockets made light of the loss of Pontus Aspgren earlier in the night to power past Redcar 55-35 in the second leg of their Semi-Final tie to ease through 97-83 on aggregate.
They will now face either Edinburgh or Somerset – who must replay the other Semi-Final tie after a 90-90 draw - to decide the destination of the trophy. It will be the Rockets’ fifth appearance in the Final; they lifted the Cup in 1979 (beating Berwick), and were beaten finalists in 1977 (losing to Eastbourne), 1992 (Peterborough), 2005 (King’s Lynn).
Trailing 48-42 from July’s first leg on Teesside, the Rockets made immediate inroads here. Olly Allen and Jason Bunyan opened the proceedings with a 4-2 either side of Hugh Skidmore, then Kasper Lykke weaved his way through the field to join Ben Morley on a 5-1 in Heat 2.
Jason Bunyan and Tyson Nelson added further 5-1s when paired together in Heats 3 and 5 to drive the score to 22-8, and with the Tactical rule excluded from this competition there was simply no way back for the Bears from that.
To their credit, Aaron Summers (two), Mickey Dyer and guest Ashley (who replaced the originally programmed Thomas Jorgensen) steadied their ship with race wins, but Nelson and Kasper Lykke finally sealed the deal mathematically with a 4-2 in Heat 14, before a 5-1 from Anders Mellgren and Nelson added an emphatic exclamation point to the final four laps of the tie.
As team manager John Sampford said afterwards, “Losing Pontus Aspgren earlier on in the night did not bode well, but the rest of the boys really rallied round and got stuck in. It certainly helped that we made such a strong start because that kept the momentum and advantage in our favour, even though it took until Heat 14 to clinch the tie.
“The boys are absolutely ecstatic to be in the Cup Final. After everything that has befallen us injury-wise this year, our season is still very much alive.â€
Rye House scorers:
Anders Mellgren 14+1, Tyson Nelson 12+3, Jason Bunyan 12, Olly Allen 8, Ben Morley (guest) 5+1, Kasper Lykke 4+2, Pontus Aspgren R/R
Redcar scorers:
Micky Dyer 9, Carl Wilkinson 7, Hugh Skidmore 6+1, Aaron Summers 6, Ashley Birks (guest) 5, Ulrich Ostergaard 2+1, Steve Worrall 0.
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