Chong Son Kung Fu’s red-hot streak continues as they won their fourth straight game home, beating the league-leading Hong Kong Eastern Basketball Team, 87-76, Tuesday night at the Nanhai Gymnasium.
They now take a 2-1 lead against the defending champions in their head-to-head matchups this season and, more importantly, Kung Fu strengthened its hold of the second spot as they climb up to 13-5, a full game ahead of the third-placed Mono Vampire Basketball Club who are at 12-6.
It was reigning Heritage Import Player of the Week Mikh McKinney who led the charge for the Kung Fu with 26 points on 10 of 20 shooting from the field to overcome a relatively quiet game from Anthony Tucker who only finished with 14 points in the contest.
Justin Howard and Caelan Tiongson dominated the shaded area against the small Hong Kong Eastern squad as the two finished with double-doubles, combining for 30 points and 29 rebounds.
Their recent three-game losing slide must now feel like ancient history for Kung Fu as they’ve put together four straight wins against the top three teams in the league including two against the defending champion.
Once again, Kung Fu took advantage of Hong Kong Eastern’s struggles to make shots from the outside. In their game last week, the defending champions were 7 of 30 from the three-point range in their 94-85 loss. Now, they shot even worse, only making 4 of their 24 attempts for a paltry 16%.
In both games, Kung Fu registered 10 triples, which was more than enough to set them apart.
Hong Kong Eastern played well in the opening quarter buoyed by the hot-shooting for Marcus Elliott and Christian Standhardinger. However, Kung Fu turned things around starting in the second quarter. With locals Luo Yongxuan (10 points) and He Chongren (7 points) helping out of offense with two triples each, they pulled away in the third quarter and never looked back.
Kung Fu led by as much as 23 points before settling for the 11-point victory.
Standhardinger and Ryan Moss also grabbed double-doubles for Hong Kong Eastern with 24 and 12 and 18 and 10, respectively. Elliot added 19 points, 9 rebounds, and 6 assists but their team really missed the shooting of Tyler Lamb who only had 10 points on 4 of 20 shooting from the field.
This is not the last time these two teams would face off in the regular season as they will close out the elimination round with their fourth meeting on March 28 at the Southorn Stadium in Hong Kong.
With this win, Chong Son Kung Fu completes a perfect 10-0 slate at home becoming the first team to ever do so in the ABL since the Philippines Patriots achieved the feat back in 2009-2010.
