In­spired by an all-round per­for­mance from six-foot­er Jameela Mc­Carthy, De­fence Force was crowned cham­pi­on of the Open Di­vi­sion, in the Fe­male Bas­ket­ball As­so­ci­a­tion (Fem­BA) League on Sun­day evening.

The for­ward put on a grand dis­play both of­fen­sive­ly and de­fen­sive­ly to guide the army/coast guard com­bi­na­tion team to a 64-52 vic­to­ry over Bri­an Chase Bas­ket­ball Acad­e­my (BC­BA) in the fi­nal of the "The Re­birth" League played at the East­ern Re­gion­al In­door Sports Are­na in Tacarigua.

Mc­Carthy was lat­er de­served­ly named the "Most Valu­able Play­er" (MVP) af­ter an­oth­er dou­ble-dou­ble from the new­com­er, pro­duc­ing a match-high 21 points and pulling down 11 re­bounds.

"Win­ning the Fem­BA 2019 MVP meant a lot to me and my team. It's a bless­ing. Af­ter be­ing away from bas­ket­ball for more than a year, I knew I still had some skills in me," said Mc­Carthy with a chuck­le. "I am one of the rook­ies on the team so be­ing able to bring a high lev­el of fit­ness, ag­gres­sion, con­sis­ten­cy, youth and my US Col­lege bas­ket­ball ex­pe­ri­ence help us to vic­to­ry."

Mc­Carthy al­so had two as­sists and stole the ball five times de­spite the ef­fort of BC­BA who was with­out one of its lead­ing young stars Nakiya Bap­tiste, who has av­er­aged 15 points per game this sea­son.

She recog­nised the ef­fort of the team say­ing: "Bri­an Chase was a com­pet­i­tive team. They bring a lot of fire. They bring a dif­fer­ent style of play and the De­fence Force brought the same and the best team won which was us."

"I am proud of my­self but still have a lot of per­son­al work to do so I can be a bet­ter play both on an off the court. I look for­ward to a lot more fe­male bas­ket­ball in T&T," said Mc­Carthy, who al­so praised the ef­fort of the or­gan­is­ers of the league.

"It was a good league, the crowd was good, the sup­port­ers that are. A lot of fe­males came out and shout out to Ali­cia (Joseph) and Kyeon (Joseph) try­ing to bring back fe­male bas­ket­ball. I found it was a good league and may 2020 be a bet­ter year."

Mc­Carthy didn't do it on her own though she had great sup­port in post-play­er Ali­cia Liv­er­pool (15 pts/14 rebs) and shoot­ing guard Janeisha Cas­simy (12 pts/3 rebs).

They did have some re­sis­tance form BC­BA in the form of post play­er Al­li­son Young, who scored a team-high 18 and grabbed 14 re­bounds, and an ail­ing An­no­la Charles with 13 points and sev­en boards.

Mc­Carthy said, "Over­all my team per­for­mance was great. The team it­self was out for about two-three years so hav­ing them back says a lot. There is al­ways room for im­prove­ment so we would take our off­sea­son very se­ri­ous and put in some work so that play­ing games be­comes eas­i­er.

"Our next short term goal is to fin­ish strong at the North Zone Bas­ket­ball League which re­sume on Fri­day, where we go up against the Po­lice Ser­vice women's bas­ket­ball team at the Jean Pierre Com­plex (Mu­cu­rapo).

Po­lice fin­ished third in the league af­ter de­feat­ing Club En­ter­prise in the third-place play­off, 54-26.

Ear­li­er in the Un­der-15 di­vi­sion fi­nal, Car­risa Ram­di­al was her fan­tas­tic self and led Club En­ter­prise to vic­to­ry over Spar­tans TT, 81-36. Ram­di­al notched 29 points.

BC­BA fin­ished third af­ter a 43-32 win over Mal­oney Pac­ers Bas­ket­ball Club and youth de­vel­op­ment pro­gramme.

RE­SULTS

Open Di­vi­sion

Fi­nal

De­fence Force 64 (Jameela Mc Carthy 21 pts/11 rebs/2 asts/5 stls, Ali­cia Liv­er­pool 15 pts/14 rebs, 2 asts/2 stls, Janeisha Cas­simy 12 pts/3 rebs/4 astd/1 stl) vs BC­BA 52 (Al­li­son Young 18 pts/14 rebs/1 ast/1 stl/4 blks, An­no­la Charles 13 pts/7 rebs/1 ast/3 stls).

Third-place play­off

Po­lice 54 (Kielle Con­nel­ly 23 pts/14 rebs/4 asts, 6 stls, Leslie-Ann Bac­quain 9 pts/11 rebs/3 asts/3 stls) vs Club En­ter­prise 26 (Bri­an­na Charles 15 pts/13 rebs/3 asts/2 stls, Car­risa Ram­di­al 4 pts/1 reb/3 asts/1 stl).

Un­der-15

Fi­nal

Club En­ter­prise 81 (Car­risa Ram­di­al 29 pts/4 rebs/2 asts/4 stls, Ju­lia George 13 pts/4 asts/9 stls, Mya Ray­mond 13 pts/2 rebs/2 asts) vs Spar­tans TT 36 (Ty War­wick 18 pts/3 rebs/4 asts/1 stl, Stephanie Stephan 16 pts/26 rebs).

Third-place play­off

BC­BA 43 (Amelia Mar­shall 25 pts/9 rebs/1 ast, 9 stls, Ize -Tao Best 12 pts/8 rebs, 3 asts, 1 stl/1 blk) vs Mal­oney 32 (Alysa Con­nely 15 pts/13rebs/3 stls/2 blks, Kaylee Songui 4 pts/13rebs/stls).

2019 Ho­n­our roll

Open Di­vi­sion

Most Im­prove: Maikea Bram­ble (SOS)

Most Im­prove (Pres­i­dent's Award): Nikiya Bap­tiste (Bri­an Chase)

Top De­fen­sive Play­er: Al­li­son Young (Bri­an Chase) - 41 de­fen­sive rebs/9 blocks/26 steals)

Most Points: Al­li­son Young (Bri­an Chase) - 98 points

League MVP - Jameela Mc Carthy (De­fence Force) - 81 pts/57 rebs/10 stls/4 blks)

Coach of the League: Lin­coln Charles (De­fence Force)

Un­der-15

MVP: Car­risa Ram­di­al (Club En­ter­prise)

Fi­nals De­fen­sive Play­er: Amari­ah Clyne (Club En­ter­prise)

Most Im­prove: Eliz­a­beth Jones (Spar­tans TT) (Spon­sored by Plen­ty Sports)

Most Re­bounds: Alysa Con­nel­ly (Mal­oney Pac­ers) - 68 rebs

Top de­fen­sive play­er: Ize-Tao Best (Bri­an Chase) - 43 rebs/1 blk/13 stls)

Most Points: Amari­ah Clyne (Club En­ter­prise) - 78 pts

League MVP: Amari­ah Clyne - 78 pts/46 rebs/25 stls)

Coach of the League: Er­ic Knights (Club En­ter­prise)