Senior Boys Basketball
St. Matt's falls short in bid for senior boys hoops crown
By Fred Sherwin
Orléans Online

The St. Matt's Tigers Cedric Dumais tries to lay the ball into the basket over the outstretched arms of Sir Robert Borden's Olayiwigola Ogungbemil during the NCSSAA AAA/AAAA championship on Tuesday. Fred Sherwin/Photo

The St. Matthew Tigers bid to repeat as senior boys basketball champions fell victim to a short bench and a long court on Tuesday as the Sir Robert Borden Bengals avenged their loss to the Tigers in last year's title game.

The Carleton University Raven's Nest is 10 feet longer than a normal high school court, which is usually not a big issue unless your team happens to have a short bench and your starters are expected to play the entire game which was the case with the St. Matt's Tigers who started out strong enough, taking a three point lead midway through the first quarter on a three point basket by Matt Price.

The Tigers would extend their lead to nine points later on in the quarter when Price hit his second of three tres in the first half and by the end of the quarter they had a seven point advantage

The Bengals managed to turn things around during the opening minutes of the second stanza, going on a 7-2 run to tie the game at 22-22. Price's third three point shot of the opening half managed to momentarily stem the tide, but Borden eventually took the lead and by the end of the first quarters the score was 30-27 in favour of the Bengals.

Probably the most telling stat of the first half was the differential in rebounds, where the Bengals had a 17-9 advantage, including a 10-0 edge under the offensive glass.

Sir Robert Borden also didn't do themselves any favours by taking a ton of high risk shots. They were 1-for-14 from beyond the three point line and 13-for-37 overall. The Tigers, meanwhile, hit 50 per cent of their shots.

With several members of last year's provincial championship team looking on from the stands, the Tigers continued to play well as the second half began, making up the three point deficit within the first two minutes. At that point they were still hitting their outside shots at a better than a 50 per cent clip.

Things looked to be going the Tigers' way until the five and a half minute mark of the third quarter when the physical demands of having to play a high pressure defence on a longer court started to catch up to the St. Matt's starting five.

After St. Matt's narrowed the score to 41-40, the Bengals went on 14-2 run to blow the game wide open. The Tigers usually reliable outside shooting went stone cold. Shots that were hitting the basket during the first three quarters, were all of a sudden coming up three and four inches short, which is a clear sign of fatigue. During the latter stages of the third quarter and the entire fourth, the Tigers went 0-for-9 from beyond the arc.

Simply put, the Tigers ran out of gas. The one silver lining to the defeat is the fact that St. Matt's will still get to represent the NCSSAA at the OFSAA Quad-A championships in Oshawa after the Bengals elected to play in the AAA championships.

Despite the disappointing end to their season, the Tigers can look back on a job well done. After losing virtually their entire starting lineup to graduation, no one was picking them to make it back to the city championship.

Rather than refer to his club as overachievers, Tigers head coach Jason Wren said they worked their tails off to make it as far as they did.

"It was basically Basketball 101. They all worked extremely hard and I'm extremely proud of each and every one of them," said Wren.

As for the championship game itself, Wren said the Bengals' size combined with their ability to penetrate off the dribble was tough to counteract.

"It's hard to grow six inches in one day and when they started penetrating they just sliced and diced us to death," said Wren.

Price ended up as the Tigers top scorer with 18 points including four hree-point shots. Gavin Resch was 7-for-18 from the floor and 3-for-3 from the foul line for 17 points, and Ykealo Aria added 10.

(Posted 3 p.m., Feb.26)

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