BEIRUT: Few could sum up the final game of the regular season better than Riyadi captain Joe Vogel: “It’s crazy.” Despite a romping 82-71 win for Riyadi over Champville that moved the seven-time league champions ahead of their rivals into first place going into the Final Eight, Vogel was referring to the crowd before the game.

The start of the game was delayed after Champville’s allotted 25-man support felt greater protection was required, sitting among over a thousand boisterous Riyadi fans.

“In games that are highly tense, like Riyadi versus Champville, the federation passed a rule saying that only 25 fans can travel to the game. We opened up 30 seats and surrounded them with security personnel to stop trouble but the Champville fans wanted more protection so they requested to have the whole section to themselves. We can’t sanction that request when so many supporters want to watch the game and we need as many seats as we can to accommodate them,” said club official Tamam Jaroudi.

A trivial matter though it may seem, it took Champville legend Fadi al-Khatib to enter the stands and intervene to prevent blind, ugly violence.

With the game eventually starting 40 minutes later, the players fed off the ferocious air in the stands, putting in a display of old-fashioned, smash-mouth basketball.

Riyadi would clinch the game in the third quarter when Vogel and Dewarick Spencer nailed four straight 3-pointers, sending an already hyped up Riyadi crowd into delirium usually spared for World Cup wins and dictator topplings.

“I was just feeling warm,” Vogel told The Daily Star, “and sometimes you just know it’s going to go in; I just kept shooting. I might have pulled the trigger too quick but I was warm.

“I got in a lot of foul trouble early on, so when I came in I [wasn’t tired], I was just blessed with the shots going in.”

With the court full to the brim with some of the country’s most talented players, the play was surprisingly frustrated. Champville’s front court of Garnett Thompson and Sam Hoskin managed just four points between them by halftime, and Khatib was kept to just six with Jean Abdul Nour putting in a robust defensive shift.

Even Riyadi’s Ismael Ahmad and Dewarick Spencer struggled for long periods. Fortunately for them, Abdul Nour had the bit between his teeth and helped spearhead a supreme second-quarter performance that would eventually seal the game.

The early good play came from Karl Sarkis, who was allowed to collect nine quick points as Riyadi were more concerned with crowding out Hoskin, Khatib and Thompson.

The first quarter ended 19-17 to Riyadi before the home side dug their heels in.

Champville were held scoreless in the second quarter for seven minutes. Riyadi’s half court offense broke into life when Ali Kanaan was subbed in, feeding off backdoor cuts, exploiting the space left by Spencer’s clever runs.

After seven minutes, Khatib spun in the paint to muscle in Champville’s first points of the quarter, by which time Riyadi had opened a 13-point lead.

Late Abdul Nour and Spencer layups gave Riyadi a commanding 38-24 halftime lead.

The third quarter saw Khatib come back to something resembling his normal self, although in truth he was merely scoring the heavily contested shots that refused to hit the net in the first half.

Vogel and Spencer’s shooting fest gave Riyadi a 58-44 lead going into the final quarter where Elie Stephan would get Champville within five points with two straight 3-pointers.

An Ali Mahmoud layup and another Spencer 3-pointer booked Riyadi’s place in the Final Eight as the No. 1 seed, although that title has little bearing on the Final Eight.

“We try to stick together and play the game we like to play. We have patience. If we’re patient the game will come to us,” said Spencer. “Some days you’re on sometimes you’re off. A great player like [Khatib] we have to contain and contest all of his shots, he’ll make a few but we can live with that.”

With the game won, the fans returned to their chaotic state, flooding the court to lift up their heroes.