Basketball: Auckland Stars too good for Nelson Giants

The Auckland Stars beat the Nelson Giants 94-85 in their National Basketball League match at ASB Stadium in Auckland last night.

The early stages belonged to the Stars with Mike Homik dominating to put them 17-6 in front.

Tall Black Ed Book brought the Giants back into the game though and they only trailed 25-27 at the end of the first quarter.

But the Stars zoomed out to a 58-39 halftime lead through some classy three-point shooting from Reece Cassidy, Casey Frank -- who finished the match with an impressive 17 rebounds -- and Aaron Olson.

The Giants fired in the third quarter and outscored the Stars with some accurate shooting from Lance Baker to narrow the lead to nine points.

But, despite Olson being fouled out, the Giants could not close the gap in the last quarter and lost coach Nenad Vucinic after a second technical foul was called on him.

Stars 94 (C Frank 22, L Tait 20, D Boucher 14)

Giants 85 (D McCulloch 19, P Jones 16, L Baker 16, E Book 14)

HT: 58-39