East II leads Stingers past Alliance for fourth straight win

Sean East II continues to make his mark in the CEBL — and his Edmonton Stingers just keep rolling.

East II scored 35 points as the Stingers downed the Montreal Alliance 94-83 for their fourth straight win on Tuesday at the Edmonton EXPO Centre.

The MVP candidate also added six assists and four steals as the Stingers improved to 8-6.

Montreal, which began the season with four straight wins of its own, fell to 5-6 with the loss.

“We’re just now starting to get together, one game at a time, one practice at a time. The sky’s the limit for us,” East II said.

The Stingers held an 85-72 advantage when the clocks turned off for Target Score Time, but the Alliance — desperate for a win after their recent slide — came out firing and trimmed the Edmonton lead to 88-81 after back-to-back triples from Chris Smith and Tavian Dunn-Martin.

However, after a timeout, Scottie Lindsey responded with his second three-pointer of Target Time to put the Stingers within three points of victory.

Three possessions later, East II poked the ball away from Montreal’s Quincy Guerrier and finished the game with a layup on the other end.

Stingers head coach Jordan Baker commended East II’s performance.

“If he’s not the MVP of the league at the midway point I don’t know who is,” Baker said. “He’s carried us a lot of time and now we’ve got guys playing alongside him that are pretty damn good too.”

For East II, the performance against the Alliance was far from a one-off.

The Louisville, Kent., native entered Tuesday’s action fourth leaguewide with 23.8 points per game, first with a blistering 52.2 per cent mark from deep (minimum 25 attempts) and second with 36 three-point makes.

He helped those stats by splashing five of seven three-point attempts against Montreal — part of an efficient night in which he converted on 14 of 18 field-goal attempts overall.

His 35 points were four off the Edmonton franchise record of 39 set by three-time MVP Xavier Moon.

“I give the credit to my teammates and my coaching staff. They’re letting me play. My teammates are finding me when I’m open, we’re moving the ball well. We started [the season] out slow … but we finally found our team and I think we’re moving in the right direction,” East II said.

It wasn’t just East II fueling the Stingers, however.

Canadian Forward Keon Ambrose-Hylton contributed a 14-point, 11-rebound double-double while guard Scottie Lindsey added 19 points, including seven in Target Time.

Mason Bourcier recorded his 50th career regular-season steal in the first quarter and finished the game with three points, two rebounds and two assists.

“Our depth, if we have a couple guys who have a bad night, it doesn’t mean we lose the game. It just means someone else steps into that position and plays well for us,” Baker said.

Meanwhile, a scuffling Alliance offence continued to struggle — with one notable exception.

Shifty point guard Tavian Dunn-Martin went toe-to-toe with East II, keeping his team afloat with 30 points, including 19 in the first half.

Forwards Quincy Guerrier and Brandon Porter had 18 and 16 points, respectively.

Dunn-Martin said his team needs to get back into the lab to rediscover its early-season form.

“We just need our guys to be more confident. Right now a lot of our guys are overthinking, not playing like they did at the beginning of the season,” he said.

With the loss, Montreal remains fourth in the Eastern Conference, trailing the streaking third-place Ottawa BlackJacks, who earned their fourth straight win earlier Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the fifth-place Brampton Honey Badgers have shown recent flashes of life with wins in three of four, including a 35-point drubbing of the first-place Niagara River Lions.

Alliance head coach Jermaine Small said his team just needs to put a full game together.

“I think there’s a lot of self-inflicted wounds. I think we beat ourselves a lot. We had a lead at the beginning. We gotta play a 40-minute game,” Small said.

Edmonton raced to an early 10-point lead, but the Alliance responded to cut their deficit to just one point by the end of the first frame.

The Stingers found their form late in the second quarter, using a 16-7 run to take a 48-38 lead into halftime.

Edmonton mostly held serve in the third quarter and took a 65-57 lead into the fourth.

And by the end of the game, Edmonton found itself back in a spot it’s quickly become familiar with — the win column.

“Any time you can give 3,000-plus a good show on Canada Day,” Baker said, “it’s a positive.”

Up Next

Montreal finishes up a three-game road trip against the Saskatchewan Rattlers on Thursday, while Edmonton wraps its four-game homestand by hosting the Calgary Surge on Sunday.

Next CEBL Action

A two-game night on Thursday features the Brampton Honey Badgers hosting the Surge as well as the Alliance-Rattlers contest.