FRA - Salyers stars in Roanne Semaine des As success

NANCY (Semaine des As) - Marc Salyers was once again the inspiration for Roanne as they defeated Le Mans 87-82 to claim the Semaine des As title.

The American forward, who has paced his team throughout the tournament, turned it on again in Sunday's final, pouring in 29 points and grabbing seven rebounds as Roanne claimed their first major trophy since 1964.

Le Mans were bidding to retain the title they won last year but they came up just short, and were always chasing the game in the final two quarters.

At half-time, Roanne were leading 45-42, but they had built a seven-point lead (64-57) going into the last 10 minutes.

With eight minutes left, Vincent Collet's men had pulled 13 points clear (75-62) and the match was all but over.

Salyers, naturally, picked up the MVP award. He had impressed in the quarter-final against Dijon by scoring 29 points and collecting 13 boards, and then drained 19 points in the semi-final win over Adecco ASVEL.

His third superb performance in a row came on Sunday night, and he was helped by fellow Americans Aaron Harper (19 points) and Dewarick Spencer (18).

Roanne are joint top of the Pro A standings and Salyers, who won the French championship with Pau in 2004 and has also played for BCM Gravelines, believes this tournament can act as a catalyst for bigger things for his side this year.

"We have a good squad, with players who each have their talents, and we have a good coach," he said.

"I think we can go all the way to the title. My aim now is to win the title."

Forward Harper added: "This is great for us. We always knew we had a competitive team.

"We proved here we can fight all the way until the end. I hope we get the credit we deserve after this victory."

Le Mans had 24 points from Kenny Gregory and 16 points from fellow forward Nebojsa Bogavac in a losing cause.

Their Croatian center Sandro Nicevic said: "It is a shame but it was a great match.

"At the start, we put all the pressure on ourselves, as if we were afraid.

"We knew they had a good team and strong individual players. We came back strongly at the end, but we did two or three stupid things that cost us the match."

The result means there has been five different winners of the Semaine des As in the five years the competition has run.

Attendances were up at the tournament this year, with 21,671 people flocking to Nancy over the four days.

That figure compares favourably to the 17,150 that came to the inaugural event in Pau in 2003.

FIBA
Steve Douglas