What a great evening for everyone connected with the Brighton Bears as we got our first home win in the ULEB Cup.

For those of you who missed it, you missed out on a super night as we beat Ionikos at the Triangle.

No coach likes to look at a league table with his team in bottom place but now we are up to fourth and I want us to move up one more spot if possible.

I admit they made us fight all the way after switching to zone defence in the second half and cutting off our attacking threat but we worked it out in the end with our captain Randy Duck leading us to the win.

That coast to coast run and finish late in the game will stick in the memory, though it wasn't really planned. I called a timeout to run a play against a zone defence and right as we broke up I wondered if they would switch to man-to-man.

Not only did they do that but they moved up the court as well. Randy saw that and his eyes lit up. He hadn't seen that since the first half when he had 21 points. He blew right by them, made a tough shot and that just about did it for us.

Kendrick Warren had 15 rebounds and also played a big part for us. Kendrick's foul shooting is atrocious, he missed seven out of ten on Tuesday, but every time I complain about it, people say: "If he could shoot free throws he would never be playing in your league."

You take the good with the bad, I guess.

Getting that home win was a big deal for us. Every home date has been a hell of a game and now the fans have been rewarded and are feeling better than when they go home saying: "Gee we played well tonight but we still lost."

Thanks, by the way, for your great backing. I still believe there is room for improvement in our ULEB Cup attendances but your vocal support has been excellent. Our game with Cholet has been switched from Wednesday, January 28, to Tuesday the 27th at the Triangle to make sure all six teams in our group play on the same night in the last round of games. I will make the bold prediction that we will fill the venue for that game.

I'm not sure we played all that well on Tuesday but at least we won and still have plenty to play for in Lithuania next week.

We had one hell of a game with them in Brighton and I am really looking forward to this trip. They will be really ready for us but we will relish that. We want them to hit us with everything they have got and we'll fire it right back at them.

We have a couple of very worthwhile matchday events coming up which we are delighted to get involved with. We are holding recruitment days with Sussex Police ahead of our home games on January 24 and March 6. Running from 2pm through to game time, these will give a great insight into how you can become a police officer.

The days will involve a motivational workshop with myself, interview skills, role playing, fitness trials with our coaches and players, the chance to meet some operational police officers and then a ticket to the game in the evening.

Details of these events are at brightonbears.com or, if you bought a match programme on Tuesday, check page 57. We are delighted to play our part with the police, who in turn identify strongly with the diverse backgrounds from which we draw our team and fans.

Right, I'm all set now for Birmingham and the BBL Cup final on Sunday. It's Sheffield against Scottish Rocks.

A prediction? You've got to go with my former assistant Steve Swanson to mastermind a shock win for the Rocks. I would love Steve to get himself a winner's medal to go with the one he got with us a year ago in the National Cup.

GO BEARS