Muskies fail to grab NWOSSAA gold

Despite not claiming the NWOSSAA crown, and missing a berth at the all-Ontarios in Chatham later this month, the general vibe from members of the Muskie senior girls’ basketball team is that they’re pleased they made it as far as they did.
“I am doing better today,” captain Sarah Noonan remarked Monday. “It is disappointing [that we lost] but I can’t be disappointed with how we played.
The black-and-gold were swept in the best-of-three NWOSSAA final here last weekend by the St. Ignatius Falcons (Thunder Bay), losing the first game Friday afternoon 55-33 and then dropping the second one Saturday morning 42-34.
The Muskies had led at halftime in the second game but couldn’t hold the Falcons at bay to force a third and deciding game that afternoon.
“Overall, I am very happy with how they played. They came up against a team that, in a lot of ways, was a lot stronger than we were,” said head coach Paul Noonan.
Carling Barton noted the Falcons were a taller team, allowing them to score more points inside.
“We played really good games,” she noted. “Both of them were close and I wasn’t disappointed because I know we played well . . . I was disappointed because we don’t get to go on.”
“I think we played really well,” echoed Christin Thomson. “They were just the better team.”
Thomson admitted some of her teammates feel like they missed out on the opportunity to advance to the all-Ontarios.
“It was an awesome season, and we thought this was the best senior girls’ basketball team we have had [in a long time],” she said. “We haven’t won NorWOSSA in over 16 years.
“We gave it our best shot.”
“Our NorWOSSA trophy only dated back to 1984 so it has been at least 16 years [maybe more] since we have won NWOSSAA,” noted Noonan. “We expected to get that far [NorWOSSA] and anything after that was a bonus.”
But Noonan is confident the senior girls’ basketball team will have a good shot at making it just as far next year. “I think, for sure, we can easily take NorWOSSA next year,” she enthused.
Barton noted it was such a tough loss to swallow because it was their first legitimate chance to go to the all-Ontarios in a long time.
“It is not like [St. Ignatius] beat us by a lot. We gave them a really good fight,” she reasoned.
“Basically I think we played up to our potiental,” remarked Paul Noonan. “This is our first NorWOSSA win in over 18 years — there are no regrets — we had a great season.” he enthused.
In the opening game Friday, Noonan led the Muskie attack with 14 points, followed by Danielle McGee (nine), Siobhan Devlin (six), and Thomson (four).
Despite the loss on Friday afternoon, the Muskies were determined to take this game to a tie-breaker — and it looked as though that is what they were going to do up until the second half that is.
Noonan once again led the team in scoring Saturday morning with 18 points. Devlin was next with seven, with Kelly Crawford and Thomson chipping in four points a piece.