Home cooking certainly wasn鈥檛 what the doctor ordered this past weekend for the Sacred Heart Saints senior boys鈥� basketball tournament as the Saints had a rough time in their four team home tournament, dropping all three games to finish with a 0-3 record.
Game One saw the Saints take on the Melville Cobras; a team that they had beaten twice earlier this season.
However third time proved to be the charm for the Cobras as they picked up their first win over the Saints in three tries this season, handing Sacred Heart a 52-45 defeat. 鈥淭heir big guys gave us some trouble down low,鈥� suggested Sacred Heart head coach Garrett Karcha. 鈥淲e just couldn鈥檛 match their intensity initially and we just couldn鈥檛 shoot the ball and that鈥檚 been a struggle for us recently.
鈥淎nd after we beat them twice, I knew that they wanted to come out and win and they played with intensity.鈥�
Jake Javier led all Saints in scoring with 17 points while the rest of the team were snakebitten as Bryan Buzinski and Tannum Wyonzek were second and third in team scoring with just seven and six points respectively.
Game Two was much the same as Game One with the Saints struggling early to score while their opponent, Swan Valley, had no such problems as evidenced by the 33-19 Swan Valley lead at half time.
The visitors from Manitoba increased their lead by five throughout the third quarter, outscoring the Saints 17-12 in the third frame, before holding onto the 19 point lead for the rest of the game en route to the 68-49 win.
Wyonzek had a monster game for the Saints against Swan Valley scoring a career high 23 points while pulling down five rebounds.
Noah Clarke also put together a strong game. Clarke finished with eight points and five rebounds in the loss.
At a glance the 19 point defeat doesn鈥檛 look too positive for the Saints, however Swan Valley decimated the other two teams in the tournament (Melville and Moosomin) and are one of the top 3A teams in the province of Manitoba.
In fact, the Saints put together one of their strongest performances in recent weeks against Swan Valley. 鈥淲e had very few turnovers and we were able to score and limit them offensively,鈥� mentioned Karcha, continuing, 鈥淭hen our second unit came on and you couldn鈥檛 tell the difference between our first and second unit.
鈥淭hey played very well. We just have to get consistent and build on that.鈥�
However the Saints did not build on it as they came out flat in their final game of the tournament, scoring just three points in the first quarter and 11 in the second while the Moosomin Marquis scored seemingly at will, taking a commanding 43-14 lead into the locker room at halftime.
The Saints did get their offence going in the second half, outscoring the Marquis 40-39 in the second half, but the damage was already done as the Saints dropped their third straight game, this time by a score of 82-54.
Javier led the green clad Saints in scoring with 22 points, 18 coming by way of the three-ball (6-for-12 from three point range).
Javier also had seven rebounds and three assists in the game while Clarke had eight points and seven rebounds.
Cody Doll led all Saints with 11 boards in the loss.
The Saints are off this weekend but will be back in action March 20-21 for SHSAA 4A Regional play.
