Newcastle Eagles facing dark horses

Mar 20 2009 by Stuart Rayner, The Journal

NEWCASTLE Eagles are facing a “mental battle” with themselves. But equally important to player-coach Fabulous Flournoy is landing psychological blows against the play-off dark horses.

After lifting the British Basketball League Trophy in Guildford last week, the Eagles are back in league action with tonight’s visit of Chester Jets and Sunday’s trip to Milton Keynes.

Both sides are far too inconsistent to feature in the title race, but it makes them dangerous play-off propositions.

“The teams we’re going to be playing will be ready to play, so we have to be, too,” the New Yorker warned.

“Chester haven’t played particularly well over the season but they’re gaining momentum. They’re sleeping giants and one of the teams you don’t want to face in the final stages of the season or the play-offs. Paul Smith winning coach of the month shows you the form they’re hitting.

“Milton Keynes have emerged as a powerhouse team in the last couple of seasons but they’ve failed to find any consistency this season.

“So being that we’ve just won a trophy, I’d say it’s probably one of the biggest weekends of the season to date.

“At some point, we’re going to face one of these teams in the play-offs and we don’t want to give them any momentum. It’s a game within a game once a team feel they can beat you. If they believe that, it’s only a matter of time. They have to understand they have to do everything right, then we have to make a few mistakes, for them to win.”

Flournoy has become well versed in acceptance speeches but some of his players collected their first winners’ medals against Guildford. So he will have to use his experience to ensure none rest on their laurels.

“They have the right to celebrate,” he said. “I don’t want to be the spoilsport but we’ve only done part of the job we set out to do, which was to give ourselves the opportunity to win every piece of silverware up for grabs.

“I’m just trying to protect against that (complacency) with hard training sessions.”

In the Eagles’ favour is Lynard Stewart’s availability. It is not quite that simple, though, claimed Flournoy, who left last season’s BBL MVP on the sidelines last week.

“It took a while to figure out how to play without Lynard (when he had a knee injury), the team was built around him,” the 35-year-old admitted. “Now we’ve got to figure out how to play with him again. We’ve found a formula that’s started working and we can’t just forget it to accommodate Lynard.

“Lynard was fit and ready to go near enough two weeks before the final, but we didn’t want to disrupt the flow and the rhythm.”

It is a test of Flournoy’s man-management. “Lynard has been there every step of the way,” he explained. “Although I’ve got a reputation for shouting and screaming, I spend a lot of one-on-one time with them.”