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| Photo via @StJamesAthletic |
GUELPH — They say defence wins championships, and the St. James Lions believe that to be true.
"We didn't look really comfortable on
offence," St. James coach Bob Sharpe said.
"We looked a little awkward
at times and a little unsure. Maybe we were a little excited about
things, but we've tried to stress all year that the D's got to stay
constant and that the D was going to win the game for us. I thought
again that we played really, really good defence."
Alex MacKeigan and Keegan Feeney combined
for five points for the Lions in their 60-47 CWOSSA AAA senior boys'
basketball championship win over the Galt Ghosts of Cambridge Monday
night at St. James, but they might have shared the most important
assignment for the Lions. They had the task of guarding tall T.J. Lall
of the Ghosts, likely the best individual player in the tournament.
"Alex is pretty tenacious, and if you give
him a job he'll take it on," Sharpe said. "He's worked really hard the
two years he's played for us, and his improvement as a player overall
has been excellent. He's not a very physical guy, but he'll give you
everything he's got. With a guy like Lall with his size, his length,
there's only so much you can do with him. I thought he did a great job
and I thought Quinn Feeney did a good job. Between the two of them, we
did the best we could against him."
"I just stayed on him, made sure he didn't
get the ball and doesn't do anything with it," MacKeigan said.
"Basically when I was playing defence on him, I felt confident. It got
me through the game and got us the win. Defence wins games, right? It
was a great team effort."
"That was our main focus," Feeney said of
the defensive play. "T.J.'s a great scorer so we focused on that.
Everyone else on their team can hit their shots, so everyone had to play
their parts."
While Lall managed to hit for a game-high 27
points, he was denied the ability to take control of the game by the
pesky Lions.
"T.J. Lall hit some incredible long-distance
shots, but all said and done, he's going to get his points, anyway,"
Sharpe said. "I thought we did a really good job of neutralizing their
other players."
"He's quick and he's really long," Feeney
said. "He gets the first step and then he's at the rim so, really,
you've got to get in front of him and do your best."
Galt hung around during the game, proving to
be a worthy adversary. The Lions were up 17-7 at the end of the first
quarter and 24-21 at halftime before the Ghosts tied it at 35 midway
through the third quarter. After that, the hosts went on a 10-2 run to
finish the quarter, then ramped up their intensity on defence to hold
Galt to 10 points in the final quarter.
Joey Hasson, who also spent some time
guarding Lall, led the Lions with 18 points while Mitch Marquis and
Brandon Evans had 10 apiece and Keegan Feeney netted nine.
While Lall led Galt, next on the scoring list for the Ghosts was Lazar Stevanovic with six points.
The Lions advance to the OFSAA provincial
championship tournament March 9 to 11 at Windsor. It'll be their second
consecutive appearance in the tournament.
"Win D10 first, then CWOSSA," MacKeigan said. "Now we're going to OFSAA, baby!"
In the semifinals, the Lions downed the
North Park Trojans of Brantford 51-29, while Galt defeated the
Kitchener-Waterloo Raiders 62-48.
St. James's defence was on display in the
second half of its semifinal win as the Lions limited the Trojans to six
points after the intermission. St. James led 20-9 at the end of the
first quarter, 28-23 at halftime and 44-25 after the third quarter.
Hasson connected for 15 points for the Lions while Brennan O'Connor had 11 and Evans added six.
Matt Minutillo had 17 points for North Park.
Junior
The St. John's Green Eagles of Brantford
claimed the CWOSSA title with a 49-39 win over the Bluevale Knights of
Waterloo.
St. John's held quarter leads of 5-2, 21-15 and 29-19.
Ryan Kidd and Tommy Gemmell had nine points
apiece for St. John's, while Greg Smith had 15 and Will Sheffler 11 for
Bluevale.
The Guelph CVI Green Gaels were ousted from
the tournament after they suffered a 62-49 loss to St. John's in the
semifinals.
The Gaels trailed 16-9 at the end of the
first quarter and 34-18 at halftime before closing the gap to 40-37 by
the end of the third quarter.
Lincoln Rosebush hit for 19 points for GCVI while Rip Singh had 13 and Kyle Kush added eight.
Ben Kwasnik had 19 points for St. John's while Kidd and Chris Brewster collected 12 apiece.
Bluevale edged the St. David Celtics of Waterloo 38-36 in the other semifinal.
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