Mitch Calvert
Junior team
also wins gold
That collective sigh of relief you heard Friday night likely came from the Muskie senior boys’ basketball team.
The heavy favourites nearly were dealt a knockout punch in the game that mattered most—just sneaking past the Kenora Broncos 56-46 in the NorWOSSA final at Fort High.
“Kenora definitely came out to play,” Muskie coach Paul Noonan said. “They were shooting well, got a lot of three-point shots in there, and never quit.
“You want to win a game, but you want to win it against a worthy opponent, and they were that today,” he lauded.
The black-and-gold jumped out to a 15-9 lead after one quarter and looked to be in full control, but three three-pointers by the Broncos in a two-minute span in the second quarter closed the gap to 18-15.
Veteran guard Garnet Cornell then hit a jump shot at the buzzer to give the Muskies a comfortable 30-23 lead at halftime, but the Broncos refused to roll over and die.
The visitors converted on four more three-pointers in a third quarter that saw them score 17 points—and the Muskies’ undefeated season in NorWOSSA play looked very much in jeopardy with just a 43-40 lead heading into the fourth.
The Muskies definitely sensed some of that pressure, and turned the ball over several times unnecessarily in the final frame.
“We had the lead and we were trying to force the ball inside when the pass wasn’t there,” Noonan explained. “Kenora ended up coming up with an intercepted pass two or three times in a row when we didn’t have to force those plays.”
But after Noonan called a time-out late in the fourth, the Muskies put the clamps down and ate up valuable minutes on the clock with smart ball control.
“Once we had our time-out, we started to use more perimeter passing, and when you do that enough, eventually the inside is going to open up and that’s what happened,” Noonan remarked.
Cornell came up big with 12 of his 22 points in the second half, taking charge when the Muskies needed him most.
“He’s able to penetrate and get inside for shots, but he can also score the outside ones,” Noonan noted. “He’s definitely the floor general out there and he did a good job.”
Despite more than a few tense moments, and likely some extra grey hairs, Noonan said having the team pushed to their limits was a good thing in the long run.
“Had we come up against a team that threw in the towel early, it wouldn’t have helped us,” he reasoned. “You want to have that close battle right down to the end of the game because you want to know how the guys are going to handle that pressure.”
Travis Stromness added 13 points for the Muskies, and also used his size and tenacity in the paint to force the Broncos into foul trouble. He converted on five of six free-throw attempts, including several late in the game to seal the victory and a berth in the best-of-three NWOSSAA final later this week in Thunder Bay.
Fort High will face the winner of the Thunder Bay high school final. The Westgate Tigers took Game 1 of the best-of-three showdown over the Churchill Trojans 50-42 last Friday, with the teams meeting again last night in Game 2 (the outcome was unavailable as of press time).
Churchill finished the regular season atop the standings at 8-1, and the Muskies are familiar with that team having beat them here at their home tournament earlier in the season.
“We know we are going to match up well against them,” Noonan said. “We don’t feel like it’s a game where we are going to go down there and lose by 10 or 15 points and feel like we did all right.
“I think we match up well size-wise with them,” he added. “They [Churchill] aren’t a big team, and in general the calibre of basketball in Thunder Bay is not where it has been in past years.
“I think we have a genuine shot at a trip to OFSAA this year.”
Juniors win
The Muskie junior boys’ basketball team, meanwhile, wrapped up a stellar season of their own with a 43-40 win over the Broncos in the NorWOSSA final here Friday.
The black-and-gold jumped out to an 8-0 run to start the game and led 14-2 after one quarter, then stretched that lead to 26-13 at the half.
“Our first half was exactly what we wanted to do,” coach Greg Ste. Croix enthused. “We had a lot of good team energy and worked hard on both ends of the floor in a win against the Falls junior varsity team [the night before], and that carried over in the first half.”
The Muskies made things hard on themselves in the second half and it nearly cost them as the Broncos fought back to close the gap to 35-25 after three quarters.
“[Kenora] played a really relaxed 2-3 zone, so there’s no purpose when you are up to force the ball inside where they have five guys,” Ste. Croix reasoned.
However, Fort High was able to slow the game down in the fourth quarter and run out the clock for the gold medal (there is no NWOSSAA playoff at the junior level).
“As long as we rebounded the ball and didn’t force the issue, we were okay, because they were packing the key,” Ste. Croix noted. “We didn’t have to shoot the ball with the lead, so we spent the majority of the fourth quarter controlling the ball.
“I credit Tim Metke, Joey Ballan, and Brandon Sinclair,” he added. “They really implemented that well late in the game.”
Despite the hiccup with a loss to Dryden late in the regular season to finish atop the standings with a 7-1 record, Ste. Croix said he was very pleased with the way the team came together for the championship game.
“A very good year, a very good group of boys,” Ste. Croix remarked. “You’d like to go undefeated, but there’s [just] one game that matters.”
