Unofficial Flyers

2008/09 under 18's team

 2009/10 Season Match Reports are at the bottom of the page.

Flyers enter two U18 teams

 Bristol Academy Flyers have entered under 18 teams into two leagues this season.

The first team will play in the Premier South Division, and will be coached by GUY COLES.

The other team will play in the South West Conference, and will also be coached by GUY COLES

We asked Guy for his thoughts on the season ahead.

 U18's Premier South team

"It is going to be an interesting season for the Under 18's premier team because the structure of the league has changed. Instead of a multi regional approach the league is split into North and South. This means the competition will be a lot tougher and there will be more games to be played. Although we haven't started pre season yet we have been in off season training which the players have taken to really well. This has involved conditioning work both on and off the court. We will need to be in good shape for the season as there are a lot of tough journeys away. 
 
Every year there will be a couple of surprise teams but you can always count on clubs like Solent and Reading to produce good basketball squads. As well as these two , the London teams will cause some problems especially on their home court. Having said this I feel with the players I have, and their attitude, we can acheive a lot this year as long as we remain as a team".

 U18's Conference team

24th Oct 2009

U18's Premier South

Solent too strong for Bristol Academy Flyers Under 18’s.

Solent Kestrels flew into Bristol on Saturday and managed to beat the Bristol Academy Flyers Under 18’s 69-57. The Kestrels started strong opening up a 15- 3 lead in the first 6 minutes. The Flyer’s switched up their defense at this point and it had a dramatic effect on the game. Some strong moves under the basket from Bristol’s Joel Osborne brought the game back to 5 points with Kestrels leading 19-14 at the end of the quarter.

Kestrels couldn’t shake the Flyers in the second quarter and by the end of the half there was still only 5 points between the two teams. 35-30. The second half was a low scoring affair for both teams which meant either team had the chance to win heading into the final 4^th quarter but it was more difficult for the Flyer’s as they hadn’t had the lead at any point during the game. IN the 4^th the Solent team pulled away with some important baskets and this lead them to a win with the 69-57 scoreline. 

The Bristol Under 18’s team’s results haven’t been going the right way for the majority of the season but Coach Guy Coles believes that things can change “ Although we are 1-3 in terms of wins and losses we have competed with all of the teams we have played. Some things have been out of our control but there has been a lack of effort and execution which has cost us in a few of our fixtures. I believe we have the ability and talent to be amongst the top end of the league but we need to turn the corner and this starts in our practices”.

The Flyers team face strong league contenders the Reading Rockets on Saturday which will hopefully give them the chance to prove themselves as contenders.

Flyers U18 go on a crusade and beat Medway

Bristol Academy Flyers U18’s had their first league home game of the season as they face Medway Park Crusaders. During the warm up it could be seen that it was going to be a tough encounter as the Crusaders warmed up with great intensity considering their long trip to get to the WISE Campus Arena in Bristol.

The first quarter was a tense affair with the lead changing several times. Bristol’s Ire Omeyeni was the spark of the team’s offense scoring 11 of the Flyer’s 19 points. On the other hand Crusaders approach was a lot more collective with a lot of transition points scored against a Bristol defense that couldn’t get back and defend in time allowing easy baskets. The second quarter saw the Kent team continue to run the basketball and get easy scores in transition. The flyers offense on the other hand was spluttering and they failed to convert a lot of the chances they had both on the fast break and in the half court. This meant that going into the half Medway were up by 3 leading 41-38.

The second half saw the game turned on its head with some great individual performances from the Japanese Bullet Almasi Shimpei- Hanada and the other Flyers Point Guard Rob Loftman. They combined for 38 of the teams 47 second half points, razzling and dazzling with moves around the baskets and deep three pointers. Although their individual effort helped the team on the offensive end it was the team’s defense that snuffed out Medway’s chances of winning the game. Some great defense from men’s team player Mike Farage and 1^st year academy player Andy Hambleton helped hold the crusaders to only 25 points in the second half, 16 less than they scored in the first half.

The combination of individualism on offense and team effort on defense meant the Flyers ran out winner 85 – 66. Credit has to be given to the Medway Park Crusaders team, they didn’t give up the whole game and stuck to the system that the Coach employed throughout.

Flyers Coach Guy Coles was happy with the result and said the following “ It was great to see everyone who stepped on the floor working as hard as they did and hopefully this win can be a springboard to good things happening in the future against even tougher opposition.”

Top scorers for Flyers were : Loftman 31, Hanada 28, Omeyeni 14,