The Guangdong Southern Tigers took control of the Chinese Basketball Association Finals with a 22-point win over the Liaoning Flying Leopards in game one on Tuesday night.

Guangdong, the reigning CBA champions and top team in the regular season, ran out 110-88 winners in Qingdao, firmly establishing their status as favourites in the best-of-three series. CBA president Yao Ming was among the crowd watching on.

It was a tight game to start with and only one point separated the teams at the end of the first quarter, with Guangdong leading 25-24. The champions, who are looking for a 10th CBA crown, never looked back.

By half-time the lead was five points, cut down from a 10-point gap at one point, which was extended to seven going in to the final period, even after Liaoning had a 73-72 lead with a little over two minutes left in the third quarter. That was a blowout with the Tigers outscoring the Leopards 30-15.

“It was not an easy win. Both sides played a tough game. We were the luckier team today,” Tigers head coach Du Feng said.

Guangdong’s Sonny Weems led the scoring with 28 points, plus nine boards, while teammates Zhou Peng (20), Zhao Rui (16) and Ren Junfei (12) all helped out.

Yi Jianlian, who made his comeback from injury in the decisive third game of the semi-finals against Jeremy Lin’s Beijing Ducks and is chasing a sixth CBA ring, scored nine points in 26 minutes.

Liaoning were led by OJ Mayo’s 21 points, 17 of which came in the first half. Han Dejun had 16 points and Guo Ailun had 14.

“Tonight we played against a good team. In game two, we need to play much better,” Mayo said. That next game is on Thursday night.

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