The 2012/13 Leicester Riders: An Incredible Ride

When writing about the season that the Jelson Homes DMU Leicester Riders have enjoyed this year, you get to a point where you run out of adjectives. Outstanding, dominant, incredible – they’ve all been used before…numerous times.

The fact of the matter is that the past year has been the greatest in the clubs history. Record after record has been smashed, players have shone by playing a brand of basketball that’s become known as ‘Riders basketball’ and head coach Rob Paternostro’s stock as the arguably the league’s finest grew with every game that passed.

After all, this is a club that nearly went out of existence just over six years ago. The building work done by directors Kevin Routledge and Russell Levenston since they took over at the East Midlands outfit has been hugely impressive, whilst their gamble on a coach with no prior experience has paid off massively.

The pinnacle of Riders season came in front of 8,500 fans at a packed Wembley Arena, as they emerged winners of the BBL Play-Off Final following an 68-57 victory over Newcastle Eagles – an established side that were all-dominating last season.

“It’s a feeling of excitement and relief,” said Paternostro after the final buzzer.

“I felt that this team, this year, deserved to go out like this. With the type of season that we’ve had, nothing less than a win for us was ever going to be good enough. I thought we dominated from start to finish. We had a couple of lapses here and there, but we knew that was going to be a problem at times. We just kept going; 40 minutes, 90 feet – that’s been our motto all year.”

Despite a first-half of incredible dominance, at the start of the third quarter, Newcastle reduced their deficit to single figures. It was a run of events that left many people inside Wembley thinking that a repeat of January’s BBL Cup Final could be on the cards, where the Eagles ran Riders close in the dying seconds of the game.

But Paternostro doesn’t think about ‘what ifs’. Confidence in his team’s ability and condition remained strong, and he revealed his message to the team was simple.

“We talked about Newcastle getting back into it, but we just said ‘deal with it if they do’,” he said.

“We don’t need to focus too much on the scoreboard, just keep going and I don’t think our guys were too worried about it. Once they got out on the floor in the second half, we were able to keep the energy up, which I thought was important. This was a game in the season about conditioning and I thought our team, all through the season and all through the year, was in great condition – and they showed that today. Remember, the type of schedule we played at the end of the season was gruelling; six games in eleven days, eleven games in eighteen days and later these quick turnaround Play-Off games – we had more energy in every game than everybody else and that’s a testament to our guys, their conditioning, their heart and their will to win.”

The final words are to be left to a few of the victorious Leicester Riders players, whose hard work, commitment and passion have been infectious all season, leaving mutual fans of the game admiring the team that has been an unstoppable force.

Riders centre, Anthony Rowe: “Right now; it’s unreal. I must admit, at the start of the season, I was at my lowest. I was injured and without a job and now I’m a Rider and it’s got better and better every month. Now this…I can’t put it into words, I’m on cloud nine, it’s excellent.

“I think we had to change our game plan just a tad today. We’re a defensive team, but I think our defensive intensity was even higher today and that’s probably why our offence was a little scrappy today and not as clinical, simply because we were working so hard and a lot of energy was spent on defence.”

Spanish guard, Jorge Calvo: “I’m really, really happy. Not just for me, but for all of my team-mates, my coaches and all of the other things that are involved with the team. You look at the scenes after the game, with all of the fans joining us on the court, it’s like we’re in Leicester!

“For us, as soon as we got here, the feeling was the same – we’ve got to play basketball and we’ve got to play our game. We have to forget anything else around the court, but I have to admit that it was awesome to play at Wembley.

“From the first game, we knew that we would build our game on the defence – that’s what we do and we’re happy to have established that identity this season.”

Guard Zaire Taylor: “This is a good feeling, but it’s almost a bittersweet feeling. Now, I’m back to reality. Basketball is always a great distraction, but now it’s back to the real world. It’s strange.

“The highlight for me and there was a moment in the game, where Jamell Anderson dunked on Kareem Maddox. That literally made me jump out of my seat.”