By RENALDO SMITH, NG Sports Reporter

renaldo@nasguard.com

Going into the New Providence Basketball Association's post season, many predicted that the Division 2 Sunshine Auto Ruff Ryders would be a force to be reckoned with.

Those predictions may just turn out to be true, if their performance in their first test of the playoffs on Saturday was any indication of their ability.

In a game that was never close, the Ryders cruised to an easy 88-61 win, in Game One of their best-of-three series against the Coco Cola Explorers at the Kendal Isaacs Gymnasium.

After the game, Ryders point guard Francis Farrington talked about taking the 1-0 lead in impressive fashion.

"It feels good, but of course we can't relax because we still have one more game left. But it is good for our confidence as we are going into the second game, so I feel pretty good about it," said Farrington. "We always focus and practice hard on defence, so it was good to see that the guys had the energy at the start of the game. We expected it from the guys with a lot of experience so it's good to finally get that push from all of the guys, and especially our bench this year. Coming down the stretch it is going to get a lot tougher because some of the guys have to go away and some of the guys have to work. We will try to help the other guys pick up the slack and hopefully we can stay strong a play hard defence and come out with a trip to the finals," he added.

Farrington took control of the game from the tip off as he was able to penetrate the lane at will, and wasted little time getting his team-mates involved. His hot hand and forward Lamon Johnson's dominance inside allowed the Ryders to open the game on a 15-0 run.

That lead ballooned to 26-3 in the first quarter as Ryders shooing guard Ernest Saunders began to find his groove offensively.

With a much smaller team, the Explorers appeared to be rattled early on as the Ryders kept them down by double digits much of the game.

Point guard Kevin Wright was unable to get any penetration at all against the fierce Ryders defence, and the Explorers could not get anything going offensively.

As the game progressed, the Ryders put on clinic on both ends of the court.

Centre Patrick Arthur owned both the offensive and defensive boards, while Saunders, Farrington, and versatile guard Mario Martin took turns splitting defences for easy lay-ups.

Led by small forward David Wright, the Explorers never gave up, but simply could not get any stops at all against a squad that was firing on all cylinders.

According to Explorers Head Coach Terrell Duncombe, his squad didn't have a lot of their consistent players, and it showed in their performance.

"We came out kind of slow based on the situation that we had. Within the team we had number of our players who could not come out to the game because the majority of our players went on a college tour to Las Vegas. Basically we were left to about seven players and most of them were guards. We basically went with what we had, and we came out a little slow and was unable to overcome the deficit," said Duncombe. "We are hoping to have them back for Game Two. But they played a good game so we can't use that as an excuse. We are basically going to try to regroup and see what happens next time. We played this team once, and we didn't get a chance to watch them and see what's going on. But now we know, and we should be better next time, regardless if our players are here or not," he added.

Saunders had a game-high 16 points, and Farrington added 10 points in the blow-out win for the Ryders.

Valentino Simmons had a team-high of 14 points in the disappointing loss for the Explorers.

However, the Ruff Ryders Division One squad did not fare as well as they fell 91-86 to the Explorers on Saturday.

The combo of Leroy Sanders and Lamar Wakins, who had 24 points each, proved to be too much for the Ryders.

Nelson Joseph led the Ryders with a team-high 21 points in the losing effort.

Look for the second game in the series between two very talented squads to be a classic.