Wolves chasing double over Riders

9:15am Saturday 16th February 2008

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WORCESTER Wolves will look to give Leicester Riders another beating at the Uni-versity of Worcester tonight (7pm tip-off).

Skouson Harker's side beat the East Midlands outfit 92-85 back in October and another win over the Riders will keep the Wolves in the hunt for the play-offs in the British Basketball League.

Harker said: "This game is very important. Our on-court mental toughness and focus need to improve.

"With this we will be a hard team to beat. Having lost the last four games (twice to Ply-mouth, once to Newcastle and Guildford) the guys are very hungry to get back on track.

"Although it was very disappointing to not pick up a win in any of these matches, I think we learned a lot from the defeats and we are in a fine position to move up."

Player-coach Harker is pleased to have James Life back to full fitness after his bout of flu which prevented him from playing against Newcastle last Friday.

"James is back 100 per cent after his bout of flu," beamed Harker.

"He did remarkably well against Plymouth last Sat-urday especially after being too ill to travel up to Newcastle the night before."

But Life is not the only threat that the Wolves possess in their ever-improving side.

Riders' coach Martin Ford is also wary of Anthony Paez, the BBL player of the month for November.

"I had a word with Gary Stronach about how Plymouth beat them and we know that they have two prolific scorers in James Life and Anthony Paez," said Ford.

"By all accounts they give them the ball as often as possible and go after the rebounds when they miss.

"They've got a great rebounder in Shaun Durant. He's happy with his role of getting as many offensive boards as possible and then spinning the ball out to Life and Paez.

"They have instant offence on either side, so we're going to need to slow the ball down and control the shooter."