Saints Invitational: Senior Edition

This year's version of the (Senior) Saints Invitational -- a 24-team event -- continues the tournament's unique traditions of years previous.

Most notably, the tournament brings together a wide variety of teams from across the province, and some very competitive ones at that.  As such, it's a difficult tournament to win not only by virtue of the teams playing, but, in addition, the winning team must put together 5 wins in a very tight time-frame.

This year's draw features several CWOSSA ranked teams (Grand River, WCI, St. Benedict, St. James, Bishop Mac, Forest Heights), as well as a couple of provincial-calibre programs (D'Youville, St. Francis, St. Patrick's).

It's a "pool play" event this year.  24 teams, with the winning team from each pool advancing to the quarterfinals.  2nd place teams will play an 8-team "consolation bracket" and 3rd place finishers will play one remaining game against another 3rd place finisher.

Pools are:

A - WCI, Appleby College, St. Anne's (Windsor)

B - St. Benedict, Clarke Rd. (London), Huront Hts. (Kitchener)

C - LaSalle (Sudbury), Glendale (Hamilton), St. Francis (St. Catharines)

D - Jacob Hespeler, St. James, Kingston Frontenac

E - Grand River, Bishop Mac, Turner Fenton (Brampton)

F - St. Pat's (Sarnia), Richmond Hill, Collingwood

G - St. John's, D'Youville, Peterborough Adam Scott

H - Forest Hts., Monsignor Doyle, St. Elizabeth

Pools A & B are at St. Benedict.  Pools C, D, E, F are at Jacob Hespeler (2 gyms), and Pools G & H are over at Monsignor Doyle.

As for my "viewing recommendations for Friday", I've put together a "Cambridge road trip" for you, with what I feel are the best games of the day:

9:30am (JHSS):  Grand River vs. Bishop Mac --- Self explanatory, two "top 10 calibre" CWOSSA teams.

11am (SBCSS):  St. Benedict vs. Kitchener Huron Heights --- Again, two ranked CWOSSA teams and get to check out the host Saints in action.

2pm (JHSS):  St. Pat's vs. Richmond Hill --- No CWOSSA representation here, but a team in St. Pat's that has had some early-season tournament success and should be one of the better teams here at this tournament.

3:30pm (JHSS):  Both Grand River and St. James, two of my top 5 CWOSSA teams, are playing at the same time.  Neat opportunity to shuttle back-and-forth between the gyms and check these teams out.

OR

3:30pm (SBCSS):  WCI vs. St. Anne (Windsor) --- These teams played a very tight game a couple weeks' back in tournament play, and this should be no exception.  6'7" St. Anne scoring star Anthony Zrvnar is fun to watch.

Don't forget there's also a junior portion to the tournament, so my "late day" viewing picks would probably feature second round games from that 16-team draw:

8pm (SBCSS, Projected):  St. Benedict vs. Guelph CVI --- Two "top 10" CWOSSA teams could be potentially meeting in the 2nd round, though the Gaels have been struggling a bit lately.