In a gala event held at Zagames (Main Road) the lads frocked up with their partners for the unveiling of the inaugural Sovereign Knights player awards.

As voted by his peers Mark was deemed the Most Valuable Player to the franchise for his complete skills in strategically leading the team, both offensively and defensively. Mark collected an average 11.5 points per game, pulled down 9.3 rebounds and dish out 3.8 assists on the offensive end.

In accepting the MVP, Mark (the spiritual leader of the club) was very humble at the thought of receiving the award and thanked his team mates for all of their hard-work throughout the season, and wished everyone a safe off-season, with lots of training.

Azz was voted All-Defensive for his consistent intensity on D throughout the entire season, forming an integral part in defensive structures and applying the trademark Sovs ball aggression. With stats of 2.3 blocks per game, 4.1 steals per game and 7.9 rebounds per game Azz will be hard to look past next season for the same award.
Azz was ecstatic and quickly downed his pot in record time before giving his acceptance speech by saying “this performance would not have been at all possible if it were not for god, my family and my girlfriend Stacey who have supported me all season.”

In a landslide poll the big man Ro received the Most Improved Award for increasing his skills and knowledge the most over the course of the season. Ro came into the squad a little wet behind the ears, but soon cemented his spot in the starting line-up by increasing his statistical averages and in dominating the boards. In the end Ro finished with excellent numbers of 6.7 points per game and 11.2 rebounds per game.

In a media rush to interview the young champ, Ro he simply attributed his season’s performance to great training mates and hard work, whilst reaching for another pot.

Last but certainly not least the Club Man Award went to Alex for his team orientated ideals. On the court Alex had a great year with hard work being displayed at both ends, whilst off the court Alex organised extra training sessions, team dinners and worked in conjunction with others for other events.
After the presentation of the Club Man Award, Alex reiterated Mark’s words and thanked everyone for their efforts in the first of many franchise seasons with Sovereign Knights and commented “I look forward to doing it all again next season.”

Game 15 was the final game of the regular season for the Sovereign Knights with a win against Version 2 keeping their finals hopes alive. The last time these teams met the Sovs smashed Version 2 in rather humid conditions.

The Sovs displayed an almost full line-up, minus guard Matt Lee with his injured ankle. With a deep bench available the Sovs implemented a rotation based system that allowed fresh legs to be on the court all night.

Unlike the previous game against the opposition, Version 2 displayed some formation and scored the first 2 points of the game. Their lead was short lived however with some quick passes into free space, which let Mark and Simon hit the cord with some delicate J’s.

The ball pressure was simply amazing from the guards (Simon, Azz and Mao) who swiped the ball more often than a woman at Myers with a credit card. Due to the lads stealing the ball the Sovs ball possession increased, which saw further points rattle on to the scoreboard.

It wasn’t only the guards who were firing but the big men took to the task also with Ro and Chunka working tirelessly on defence whilst Mark was showing how to do it in offence with some slick passes, which could have only been taught by Mao.

The Sov machine was working beautifully and the 1st half was capped off with the Widdison brothers teaming up the first buzzer beater for the season. Azz cleverly drew some inquisitive defenders and dished the ball to Mark who threw an ordinary shot (Bill Cartwright style) that managed to swish.

The lads came back from the half time break full of confidence and with fresh legs. So yet again the Sovs started running in offence and cut the Version 2 defence up with ease. The Rocket, Azz and Mao were having a last game blast by controlling the game tempo.

Rainbow Age remained rather quiet for most of the game but with some handy passes being made to him he soon got into the game scoring some much needed percentage boosting points.

Then tragedy struck for the 2nd time this season for the defensive magnate Chunka, who went down with what was believed to be the same ankle injury suffered back in game 7 against the Rockers. Chunka was quickly taken off the court with ice applied quickly to the injury.

The game continued and the Sovs played spiritedly with victory in mind for Chunka. The Sovs were reduced again with Crash managing to attract another foul from the refs that forced him from the game with 5 fouls.

With only 5 players left, the Sovs retracted into their formidable zone defence and quietly ran out the game with Azz leading all scorers for the 2nd half by keenly stealing the ball and running the court

The Sovs walked away with an easy 42-21 against Version 2. The end of season sceptical was saddened by the chance that the fans had seen Chunk’s last game.