Joey Payeur
And the Academy Award for best performance in a cliffhanger is . . .
Well, the voters probably could call it a tie. But the St. Francis Sentinels were far less concerned about winning an Oscar than defending a championship.
Showing a little true grit of their own, the Sentinels battled back from a second-half deficit before hanging on for a 16-15 victory over the Crossroads Tornadoes at the Rainy River District Athletic Association Grade 8 boys’ regional basketball championship at Robert Moore School on Saturday.
It was no easy walk to St. Francis’ second-straight regional title, and fifth in the last six years, as the nail-biting gold-medal game came on the heels of a 13-12 decision over the J.W. Walker Wildcats in the semi-finals.
Grade 7 call-up Graeme Kitt, who overcame his inexperience to be the Sentinels’ leading scorer in the tournament, set the pace in the final with eight points.
He also shared the team high in rebounds with four, along with Ben Whitburn and Jarred Taylor, another seventh-grader.
Taylor, Connor Bujold, Dane Blais, and Jacob Bolzan each added two points apiece for St. Francis, which went unbeaten in five outings at the tournament but only led Crossroads 6-5 at halftime.
The Tornadoes, which were dominated in the preliminary round by the Sentinels in a 20-2 blowout in Pool ‘B’ action, used a zone defence throughout the title game to frustrate the St. Francis offence.
Crossroads eventually grabbed an 11-8 lead midway through the second half before St. Francis used a full-court pressure defence to key a 6-0 run and go in front 14-11.
The teams then traded baskets before settling into a seemingly impenetrable defensive stature the rest of the way until the final seconds.
Trent Redsky’s jumper from the key made it a one-point game with five ticks on the clock.
But Kitt managed to inbound the ball to Bujold, who immediately put a human shield around the ball until the final buzzer sounded.
St. Francis had kicked off the day with a 19-4 win over the Grade 7 version of the Wildcats.
Kitt led the way with six points while Shawn Brady drained four. Bujould, Matt Berube, Bolzan, and Carter Brown each had a pair.
Their second game of the day saw Whitburn, Blais, Berube, and Bolzan have to miss the match-up with Crossroads due to a hockey commitment.
Surprisingly, the Sentinels looked even sharper despite their absences as the remaining five ran the Tornadoes ragged with a series of crossing patterns that left Crossroads confused and one step behind for most of the first half.
Kitt netted eight points and four rebounds in the victory while Brady had six, Brown sank four, and Bujold notched two.
Taylor was held pointless but showed his worth in a game-long match-up against Redsky, the Tornadoes’ top offensive threat, who was held in check.
The hockey quartet returned for the Sentinels’ final preliminary-round game against St. Patrick’s (Atikokan).
But against a St. Pat’s team which beat the J.W. Walker Grade 7s 14-4 but lost 15-2 to Crossroads, St. Francis looked lost on offence.
Thankfully for the Sentinels, their defence held firm and made Brady’s first-half basket and Kitt’s second-half foul shot held up for a 3-0 shutout.
Feisty Wildcats
By taking top spot in Pool ‘B’ with a 3-0 record, the Sentinels found themselves in a semi-final clash with the Grade 8 Wildcats, who survived a three-way tie-breaker to finish second in Pool ‘A’.
J.W. Walker, the Sturgeon Creek Sturgeons (Barwick), and Atikokan High School all finished with a round-robin record of 1-2, behind the host Robert Moore School Mustangs at 3-0.
With each of the three tied teams having beat one another, the next tie-breaker involved least points allowed by each team in the two games against the other tied teams.
J.W. Walker lost 15-2 to the Mustangs, beat Atikokan 18-7, and lost to Sturgeon Creek 10-9 for a total of 17 points surrendered—good enough to get the nod over Sturgeon Creek (21 points) and Atikokan (27).
But if St. Francis thought it was in for a cakewalk against the underdog Wildcats, the Sentinels received a rude awakening as J.W. Walker’s defence harassed St. Francis’ shooters at every turn from the opening tip.
Leading 6-2 at the half, the Sentinels hit a dry spell offensively, allowing J.W. Walker to creep back into the contest and ultimately take a 10-7 lead.
St. Francis discovered its shooting form just in time, with Kitt (team-high six points) draining a close-in chance in the final minute to put the Sentinels back in front by one.
The Wildcats had their chances in the final seconds but Kitt pulled down one last defensive rebound and held onto the ball until time expired.
The other semi-final saw the favoured Mustangs upset 15-9 by Crossroads, which took the lead midway through the first half and never gave it back.
Robert Moore, which also beat Sturgeon Creek 15-4 and Atikokan 12-7 in the preliminary round, tried to rally behind centre Alex Gustafson.
But when the towering post player fouled out in the waning minutes, the Mustangs couldn’t come up with any other offensive answers and were relegated to the bronze-medal game.
Facing a physically and emotionally spent Walker squad, which had to play right away after its semi-final heartbreaker, Robert Moore broke out to a big lead early en route to a 30-12 win to take third place overall.
