A big quarter from the Niagara River Lions prevented the London Lightning from closing out their first-round series on Tuesday night.
The River Lions put up 38 points in the second on their home court in St. Catharines to take a lead and then held on for a victory, cutting London’s lead in the best-of-five series to 2-1.
The Lightning had outscored Niagara 275-213 in the first two games of the series, piling up their highest point total of the season in a 151-115 Game 1 victory.
Things went differently in Game 3 as Niagara stayed with London early and shot 54.4 per cent from the field and a crazy 57.1 per cent from three-point range.
London was much quieter from long range, hitting on nine of 28 attempts.
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Royce White had a massive night for London, leading them with 25 points and pulling down 18 rebounds.
Mo Bolden had 24 points in the loss.
The Lightning played with a fairly short bench all game, using a six-man rotation for most of it. Ryan Anderson played only seven minutes.
Guillaume Bouchard and Kris Joseph each had 25 points for Niagara.
The teams will meet again at the Meridian Centre on Friday night in Game 4.
If a Game 5 is needed, it would be played Sunday, April 15 at 7 p.m. at Budweiser Gardens.
The winner of the series will face the winner of the St. John’s-Windsor matchup.
Those two teams have shifted back to Ontario and will play Game 3 in Windsor on Wednesday. St. John’s leads two games to none.
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