The Osaka Evessa started and finished strong en route to a 79-67 victory over the visiting Sendai 89ers on Thursday night.

The Evessa (16-12) jumped out to an 11-0 lead in the series opener in Osaka, and held the visitors to 36.8 percent shooting from the floor.

More important, Osaka won the scoring duel in the fourth quarter (24-16).

For the Evessa, former NBA center Josh Harrellson had a game-high 22 points and led all players with 14 rebounds. Xavier Gibson added 17 points and 12 boards and veteran floor leader Hiroyuki Kinoshita scored 10 points, including 2 of 3 on 3-point attempts. Naoaki Hashimoto and Ryo Kubota had six points apiece.

Eleven Osaka players saw court time, and all of them put points on the board.

Wendell White paced the 89ers (7-21) with 18 points and 13 rebounds. Tshilidzi Nephawe had 14 points and 12 boards, while Kaito Ishikawa scored seven points.

Sendai finished with only seven assists.

Grouses 74, Northern Happinets 73

In Akita, Toyama's Naoki Uto scored the go-ahead basket with 4 seconds remaining, then sealed the win with a game-ending steal.

Sam Willard had given the Grouses (4-24) a 72-71 lead with 1:07 left in the fourth quarter.

But the hosts pulled ahead 73-72 on Shigehiro Taguchi's outside jumper with 13 seconds left.

Toyama called a timeout and got the ball to Uto in crunch time to pull off a dramatic win.

Willard led the Grouses with 18 points and hauled in nine rebounds. Uto had a 13-point, eight-rebound, three-assist, three-steal effort. Ex-NBA big man Dexter Pittman contributed 13 points, 12 rebounds and a pair of blocks, while Masashi Joho had nine points, four assists and three steals.

For the Happinets (7-21), Seiya Ando had a team-high 19 points and Scott Morrison scored 14. Taguchi chipped in with 12 points and nine rebounds.

Toyama outscored the hosts 34-24 in the paint, and held a 45-35 edge in rebounds.

The score was tied at 38-38 entering the second half.