Southern Railway & IOB (Chennai) win the 3rd Jeppiaar Trophy in Chennai

Shining with the help of some home town advantage, the squad’s from Southern Railway and IOB (Chennai) won the Women’s and Men’s trophy respectively at the 3rd Jeppiaar All India Invitational Basketball Tournament in Chennai. Southern Railway defeated South East Central Railway (SECR) in the Women’s final on Thursday to win the championship, while IOB lifted the title after beating ONGC in a closely contested Men’s final on Friday evening at JJ Indoor Stadium.

Only in the third year since its inception, the Jeppiaar Tournament in Chennai has gained a reputation as one of the most exciting and competitive basketball championships in India, featuring some of the best club sides from across the country. The tournament, which was held from October 9-14th this year, also plays as a fitting precursor to the Senior National Basketball Championship which will be taking place in Chennai in two months.

The tournament was organised by the Jeppiaar Institute of Technology, Sriperumpudur.

The Woman’s championship featured four teams: Southern Railway, SECR, Billai Steel Plant, and Central Railway. Southern Railway had an exceptional tournament, as they won all three of their round robin games before entering the final versus SECR. After a closely-contested first quarter, the result of this final also soon became a foregone conclusion as SECR had no answers for Southern Railway’s three-pronged attack of Anitha Paul Durai, Geethu Anna Jose, and Kokila S.

Anitha was the best player in the final, leading the way with 31 points as Southern Railway won easily, 89-40. Kokila S. was rewarded for her consistent play and named as the player of the tournament in the woman’s section.

The Men’s competition featured a much wider spread of eight teams: Chennai Customs, RCF Kapurthala, Punjab Police, Indian Air Force, ONGC, Sathyabama University, Indian Army, IOB (Chennai), Integral Coach Factory (ICF) (Chennai), and hosts, Jeppiaar Institute of Technology. After the group stage, four teams: IOB, Indian Army, ONGC, and the surprise package Sathyabama University qualified for the Semi-finals. IOB and ONGC defeated Indian Army and Sathyabama in their semi-final clashes respectively on Thursday.

The Men’s final saw two experienced sides, IOB and ONGC, face off against each other in a classic encounter. The game was close throughout, with IOB leading by two at the end of the first quarter and ONGC leading by three at the end of the second. IOB began to improve their game in the third period and slowly stretch the lead in this tough, defensive match-up. By the end of the game, ONGC found it hard to close the gap as IOB won 55-48 to lift the Jeppiaar trophy for the first time.

Sathyabama won the third-place game, defeating Indian Army 74-67 behind efforts by Rikin S Pethani (22 points), Vignesh (18), and Raghu Ram (17). Pethani was named the Men’s Player of the Tournament.

The Men's winning team was awarded with Rs. 1.1 lakh, runners-up with Rs. 80,000, and 2nd runners-up with Rs. 50,000. In the Women's section, the winning team was awarded with Rs. 80,000, runners-up with Rs. 50,000, and 2nd runners-up with Rs. 30,000.

Western Railway & Chhattisgarh win thrilling final contests to hoist 25th Federation Cup trophy

In a thrilling and memorable conclusion to the 25th IMG-Reliance Federation Cup Basketball Championship for Men and Women in Raipur, Western Railway (Men) and hosts Chhattisgarh (Women) survived late comebacks by their opponents to lift the Federation Cup trophy on Tuesday, February 15th.

After squandering a 14-point half-time lead to a re-energised IOB (Chennai) side, Western Railway found themselves down by one point in the final seconds of the Men’s final. It took late game heroics from Railway’s point guard Arjun Singh ‘Golu’, who hit a drive-in jumper with just three seconds left on the clock to give Western Railway a 75-74 lead and seal an emotional victory for his team.

Behind leading scorer Vishesh Bhriguvanshi (28 points), Western Railway started off the final well, maintaining a good lead over IOB, and went into halftime up by 48-34. But they started to lose their rhythm in the third quarter as IOB began plotting a comeback. Led by the sharpshooting by Mihir Pandey, V. Mathew Revi (16), and the clutch play of international point guard Hareesh Koroth (20), IOB were on fire in the fourth quarter, barely missing a shot, and overturning an eight point deficit with five minutes to go into a one point lead in the dying seconds. It took Arjun’s game-winner in the last seconds to pull off an exciting Railway win.

Earlier in the day, another exciting game took shape in the Women’s final, as high-flying hosts Chhattisgarh took on traditional Indian powerhouse, Southern Railway. To cope with dominating Center Geethu Anna Jose, Chhattisgarh employed a double-team defense of Seema Singh and Jose Jilna. Their tactic worked early on, as Chhattisgarh played their trademark fast-paced game and led comfortably for most of the three quarters.

But Southern Railway began to make a valiant comeback in the final quarter, as Geethu was finally freed up from her shackles and began to find her baskets easily. As Chhattisgarh began to tire, Railway threatened to come back and steal the game away from the hosts. But their attempt was a too little too late, as Chhattisgarh survived to win 76-71. Chhattisgarh’s unstoppable twosome of Anju Lakra (22) and Pushpa M. (21) were once again the best players for their squad, whereas Geethu Anna Jose dropped 22 points for the losing side.

The matches to decide for third-place also took place earlier on Tuesday. After losing to Chhattisgarh in the Semi-Final, Delhi Women bounced back strong against Kerala behind Prashanti Singh (23) and Asha Hedge (18) to win 70-58. Soniya Joy had 16 points for Kerala.

In the Men’s 3rd/4th place match-up, Indian Army defeated ONGC 68-59 to seal third place. Navneet Singh led Army with 20 points and Anoop M. had 16 for ONGC.

At the end of the tournament, Vishesh Bhriguvanshi (Western Railway) and Prashanti Singh (Delhi) won the Federation Cup’s leading scorer awards.

Final Scores

Men: Western Railway 75 (Vishesh Bhriguvanshi 28, Yadwinder Singh 15) bt. IOB (Chennai) 74 (Hareesh Koroth 20, V Mathew Rewi 16).
Women: Chhattisgarh 76 (Anju Lakra 22, Pushpa M. 21, Seema Singh 13) bt. Southern Railway 71 (Geethu Anna Jose 22, Renjini Peter 15).

Third/Fourth Place Playoffs

Men: Indian Army 68 (Navneet Singh 20, Gopal Ram 13) bt. ONGC 59 (Anoop M. 16, Riyazuddin 15).
Women: Delhi 70 (Prashanti Singh 23, Asha Hedge 18) bt. Kerala 58 (Soniya Joy 16).

Leading Scorers

Men: Vishesh Bhriguvanshi (Western Railway)
Women: Prashanti Singh (Delhi)

Final Standings

Men: Western Railway, IOB (Chennai), Indian Army, ONGC
Women: Chhattisgarh, Southern Railway, Delhi, Kerala

IOB and SEC Railway lift Ramu Memorial trophies

Another edition of the Ramu Memorial Basketball Tournament (RMBT) concluded on Sunday night, with Indian Overseas Bank (IOB) and South East Central (SEC) Railway lifting the Men's and Women's trophies respectively.


Held at the Indian Gymkhana in Mumbai, the RMBT is an annual, prestigious All-India basketball tournament, now in it's 26th edition. The tournament has historically featured the best team's in India competing for the coveted trophy.

From the tournament's press release:

Indian Overseas Bank, improving in every match since their first league match loss to Indian Army, gained sweet revenge right at the end, when they outplayed the Indian Army team 71-54 in the men’s final to lift the glittering 26th UPL Ramu Memorial Trophy, sponsored by United Phorphorous Ltd. and earn a purse of Rs 1 lakh at the Indian Gymkhana, here, on Sunday.
Earlier, in the women’s final, South East Central Railway ended the four-year domination of Southern Railway, handing them a 67-57 defeat to lay their hands on the Kapila Khandvala Shield, along with a purse of Rs 50,000.

Indian Army were done in by the ‘Triple Towers’ of Indian Army, S Robinson, Vineeth Mathew and Mihir Pander... Robinson was easily the standout among both teams... He ended up with the day’s high of 24 points, while Mathew got 18 and Pandey 13. In fact, such was the dominance of IOB that they had scored 12 points before Army opened their account. With Sambhaji Kadam a pale shadow of himself and Nixon failing to find his scoring touch, Army were always playing catch up.
The women’s final saw SECR score over Southern thanks to their entire team pulling their weight. On the other hand, Southern’s reliance on Geethu Anna Jose to deliver the goods proved their undoing with the other players failing to rise to the occasion.

S. Robinson was named player of the tournament. By the way, the 'S' stands for 'Sozhasingarayer' - no wonder the media chooses to stick to the initial! This has been sweet redemption for the basketball sensation, who spent three years in basketball exile after being banned from representing his state Tamil Nadu and the national team.

Pushpa of SEC-Railway, for her consistent play throughout the competition, won the Women's player of the tournament.


Earlier, the Men's semi-finals as well as the slam dunk and three point competitions took place on Saturday evening at the Gymkhana. In the semis, IOB, led by Robinson's 29 points, defeated the rather lukewarm challenge of ONGC 74-57. Indian Army defeated last year's winners Western Railway 71-57.

Nixon from the Indian Army won the 12-man field of the three point shootout. TJ Sahi of Punjab faced a tough competition from last year's finalist Vishesh Bhriguvanshi in the slam dunk competition - TJ eventually won, dunking over two motor bikes and a carrom board in the final round (!), after which he did his signature reverse slam.

A carrom board... ha!

Anyways, this was all in all an exciting tournament, garnering a lot of attention for Indian basketball teams and stars. Granted, for the sport to really capture the imaginations of the audiences, we need to have a consistent league system instead of irregular prized/sponsored competitions. The signs are good though - with the NBA's involvement with BFI as well as their interest in the promoting the game to an Indian audience, I have no doubt that basketball, the country's second fastest growing sport, has nowhere to go but up...

Happy Holi, everybody.

Defending champs dominate Ramu Memorial group stage

The group stages of this year's Ramu Memorial Basketball Tournament (RMBT) concluded last night, with defending champs Western Railways dominating the Men's competition. SEC-Railway go into the final undefeated in the Women's field.

Held at the Indian Gymkhana in Mumbai, the RMBT is an annual, prestigious All-India basketball tournament, now in it's 26th edition. The tournament has historically featured the best team's in India competing for the coveted trophy.

In the men's competition, the teams were divided into two groups:

Group A: Western Railway, ONGC, Chennai Customs, Vijaya Bank
Group B: Indian Overseas Bank, Indian Army, Punjab, RCF-Kapurtala

Western Railway, led by V-Town prodigy and captain of the Young Cagers Vishesh Bhriguvanshi, have been on fire so far, winning all three of their group games. Vishesh has been the main perpetrator, highlighted by his 42 point scoring outburst in the close 85-80 victory over Vijaya Bank in their second game. They also beat Chennai Customs and ONGC to finish as group leaders.


ONGC also qualified from Group A, beating Vijaya Bank and Chennai Customs in their two blowout victories. Mohit Bhandari and Trideep Rai have been consistent performers in their matches.

Indian Army and the giant-killers Indian Overseas Bank (IOB) qualified from Group B for the semi-finals. Three teams in the group - IOB, Indian Army, and Punjab - finished with two victories each, leaving the qualifiers to be decided by point difference.

The big surprise were IOB, led by the recent resurgence of veteran player S. Robinson. After going 1-1 in their first two games, IOB needed a big win against a favoured Punjab side to qualify. Punjab have their own big time performers in Jagdeep Singh and TJ Sahi, but IOB rallied to win their game Thursday night 95-64, led by Robinson's 31. They finished top of the group.

Indian Army lost their first game to Punjab, but recovered well with balanced teamplay and won their next two games against IOB and RCF-Kapurtala, finishing second place in the group.

The Semi-Finals for men will both take place on Saturday the 27th.
5:00 PM: Western Railway vs. Indian Army
7:00 PM: IOB vs. ONGC

Saturday evening will also feature two of the most exciting features of the tournament, the Slam Dunk Competition and the Three Point Shootout. According to Vinod Muthukumar, one of the organizers of the event, the confirmed names for the Slam Dunk Competition so far are TJ Sahi, Jagdeep Singh, Arjun Singh, and Abhilek Paul.

There is only one group for the Women with these four teams: Southern Railway, SEC Railway, Karnataka, and Aamchi Mumbai.

Southern Railway, featuring India's basketball starlet Geethu Anna Jose and Anitha P, started off badly with close loss to SEC Railway. They went on to win their next two games against Karnataka and local favouties Aamchi Mumbai to enter the finals.

They will be joined by SEC Railway, who have won all their games, led mostly by the combined efforts of M. Pushpa and Anju Kakra.

Both the Men's and Women's Finals will be played on Sunday, February 28th. SEC Railway will play Southern Railway in the Women's Finals at 5:30 AM. The winners of the two Men's semi-finals will play the final at 7:30 the same evening.

The tournament is being played on international standard Teraflex courts and held under floodlights in a specially erected stadium. In an interesting new endeavour for Indian tournaments, a statistics programme acquired from FIBA website is being used to track individual and team statistics such points scored, shooting percentage, 3 point percentage, rebounds, assists, steals, etc. The information is regularly uploaded to the tournament's official website: www.ramumemorial.com.

As in the past, entry is free for spectators and this is being done especially to promote basketball among students and youth.

"The crowd is building day by day," said Muthukumar, "Now that the competition is getting stiffer, the audience is getting more eager. The semi final line up looks interesting."