Article By: Rob MasseyGUELPH — After a year’s absence, the Centennial Spartans are back in the District 10 high school senior boys’ basketball final.
The Spartans used Erik Sterne’s 34-point performance to down the Ross Royals 60-49 in semifinal play Thursday.
“We knew it was going to be a close game,” Centennial coach Rob Conroy said. “They’re a great team. Physically, they’re bigger than us and they’ve got a lot of great parts, but we played great as a team.”
As has been the case this season, the Spartans didn’t panic when Mike Friesen drained a three-pointer at the buzzer to put Ross ahead by eight points at the end of the first quarter.
“We had a chance to address a few things in a time out and like they’ve done all year, they responded to what we wanted them to do,” Conroy said of his players. “What we wanted to do, we put it into practice.”
The Spartans tightened up their defence and spread the offence to rally to a 29-27 lead at halftime and a 43-38 advantage after three quarters. For the hosts, their goal in the fourth quarter was to run off as much of the clock as possible.
Ross put a shadow on Sterne, the league’s MVP in the 2011-12 season, throughout the game, but he worked himself open long enough to hit four three-pointers.
“I think that was part of their game plan, from what I heard, to take the ball out of my hands,” Sterne said. “But that’s good for the team. We plan ahead, we know what’s coming and we just prepare for that to happen. We move the ball, pick the open spots and we take it from there.”
“He exemplifies what it means to be a Spartan,” Conroy said of Sterne. “He’s got a heart bigger than you can imagine and he just kept taking it at them all game long.”
Sterne also drained 12 free throws.
“I missed one,” he said, adding that he does practice shooting them regularly. “It was funny, in our Tuesday (quarter-final) game vs. (Centre Wellington), I shot 23 free throws. I got all my practice in on Tuesday. It’s certainly part of the game and you’ve got to practice free throws when you’re tired so you can make them down the stretch in the fourth quarter when you really need them.”
The clock was the enemy of both teams in the second and third quarters as it constantly malfunctioned, causing a few momentum-killing delays. Eventually, it was decided that the game’s official time would be kept by hand and the scoreboard clock would be used just as an approximate time. It never acted up again after that decision was made.
Tarang Sharma collected 10 points for Centennial, while Harnoor Samra had five.
Friesen finished the game with 19 points for Ross, while Kristian Vande Kemp had 13 and Tommy Yanchus gathered five.
As expected, Centennial will face the Bishop Macdonell Celtics in Saturday’s final at the University of Guelph’s Mitchell Athletics Centre.
Bishop Mac finished the regular season atop the standings with an 11-1 record while Centennial was second at 10-2. The teams split a pair of close matches during the season as Centennial won 72-65 in overtime Dec. 6 and the Celtics prevailed 59-58 Jan. 15.
The championship doubleheader is to start at 6 p.m. with the junior final between Bishop Macdonell and Lourdes. The seniors follow at 8 p.m.
(1) Bishop Macdonell 74, (4) St. James 42
Jesse Kendall led Bishop Mac with 28 points, while Mitchell Wood had 22 and Sean Young added 11. Liam McCormack had 11 for St. James and Mitchell Marquis had nine.
D10 Jr. Boys Basketball
Semifinals
(5) Lourdes 67, (1) Centennial 53
Craig Valeriote hit for 18 points to lead Lourdes, while Sean Gade collected 15. Mark Shinouda had 20 for Centennial while Jasmer Brar added 19.
(2) Bishop Macdonell 58, (3) Ross 52
Lukas Wood struck for 21 points for Bishop Mac, while Jake Chaput had 11 and Evan Hosker contributed 10. Daniel Street led Ross with 21 while Jake Grant had eight.
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