BBL Championship

Newcastle Eagles 105 (20, 50, 79) (Defoe 21, Smith 20, Fletcher 15)
Surrey United 78 (16, 38, 56) (Knutson 24, Setty 16, West 15)

Charles Smith further cemented his place in British basketball history as he reached 6,000 BBL points in Newcastle Eagles’ 105-78 defeat of Surrey United at Sport Central on Friday.

The legendary forward scored the required 20 points to hit his latest milestone in a dominant home win as Eagles kept up the pressure on their title rivals and improved to 5-1 at the top of the table.

Darius Defoe also continued his impressive start to the season as he poured in a team-high 21 points.

Surrey had started well, jumping out to an 8-3 lead behind a Trevor Setty triple, but that was as good as it got for the visitors.

Jack Majewski’s team did at least look like limiting the lead to single digits in the first half until Fab Flournoy hit a rare three-pointer to beat the half-time buzzer and increase the deficit to 12.

After that Newcastle were in complete control and saw out the remainder of the game with minimal fuss to set them up perfectly for Sunday’s trip to face London Lions.

Kramer Knutson was the standout performer for Surrey as he scored a game-high 24 points to go with 18 rebounds.