KYLE Carey led the way with 29 points and six rebounds as Lancashire Spinners recorded a third straight win in Division One of the National Basketball League Championship with an 85-78 victory at home to a physical London Lituanica on Saturday.

The forward followed up a 17-point haul against Tees Valley the previous weekend, finishing 11 for 14 from the field and closing the game out by making three of his four attempts from the free-throw line.

“Having a good performance in a must win game was massive but I need to continue building on this,” said Carey, who is 22 for 31over his last four games.

Steven Gayle added 20 points and four assists for the Spinners, who never trailed by more than a single point and twice opened up a 15-point lead on their way to a comfortable victory.

“What will probably not be talked about so much is the effort Kyle made on the defensive end,” said Spinners coach Neal Hopkins. “Despite [Ausridas] Petraitis having the number of points that he did, Kyle did an unbelievable job against him, limiting him to just that because he easily could’ve gone for more.”

Petraitis – Division One’s leading scorer, averaging 25 points per contest – scored 35 points and grabbed 18 rebounds, while Edvinas Vaupsas weighed in with 14 points.

The two teams met for a sixth time in 12 months and combined for 33 personal fouls.

After trading baskets in the fourth quarter, the Spinners built a 78-65 lead at the line with 5mins 47secs remaining. But London battled to within two points following a 13-2 spurt before Lancashire scored the final five points.

It was the second consecutive game that Carey led the team in scoring but he had plenty of help. In addition to Gayle, Mark Rangeley scored 15 points and Connor Murtagh had 13.

“We all know Kyle can score and he’s just starting to show everyone he can do it consistently,” said forward Rangeley. “Our team has so many threats and him getting better adds to that.”