DONGGUAN, China, March 23 (Xinhua) -- Guangdong smashed Bayi 97-81 in Game 5 of the Women's Chinese Basketball Association (WCBA) league finals to clinch the championship for the first time here on Saturday.
Winning out of the best-of-five series 3-2, Guangdong received the trophy from Yao Ming, the president of Chinese Basketball Association.
Nneka Ogwumike, a former MVP of WNBA, led the home team to launch a 12-4 run and grab a five-point lead in the first quarter, as Bayi failed to get a good start by three-pointers.
Li Meng, top scorer of Bayi, helped the visiting team narrow the gap to only one point in the second quarter, but Huang Sijing, who was banned in last match for vulgar gesture toward the audiences, led Guangdong to expand the lead.
Guangdong, which entered the WCBA finals for the third time, enlarged the difference to 17 points in the third quarter, relying on Li Yueru's consecutive scores in the paint and Huang Sijing's three-pointers.
Bayi had few measures to cut the lead in the last quarter and lost the match 97-81.
Guangdong's center Li Yueru, 2.01-meter and 19-year-old, won MVP of the WCBA finals.
Ogwumike scored a game-high 29 points and 11 assists for Guangdong, Huang Sijing and Li Yueru had 22 points each, Yang Liwei added 13 points.
On the Bayi side, Sun Mengran got a team-high 18 points and 12 rebounds, Pan Zhenqi collected 15 points and Li Meng contributed 12 points.
