Junior girls ready for provincials
Already in the provincials through an earlier qualifying tournament, the Pen-Hi Lakers finished third at the Valley junior girls’ basketball championship at Okanagan Mission on the weekend.
The Lakers won two of their three games, opening with an easy 74-18 romp over Charles Bloom.
Top scorers: Kali Loewen (14 points, six steals), Kalli Doell (13 points, seven steals), Emma Terris (12 points, three rebounds, three assists), Jennifer Hayman (10 points, eight rebounds, six steals), Olivia Devito (10 points, three assists, two steals).
In the semifinal, the Lakers shot just 2-for-22 from three-point land after going for 60 per cent in the opener, falling 52-34 to host OK Mission.
“Our transition defence, which has been a real strength for this group, was terrible,” said Lakers coach Chris Terris. “We gave up far too many easy buckets in transition."
Top scorers: Loewen (nine points, six rebounds), Doell (nine points), Hayman (four points, 10 rebounds), Terris (four points, four assists, five steals).
The Lakers bounced back to beat city and league rivals Princess Margaret Mustangs 50-21 in the third-place game.
“For Russ Reid and I, the highlight of the weekend was the chance to coach against Dave Killick (Maggie head coach who’s retiring this year) in his final game,” said Terris.
“We’ve both worked with him over the years. Dave is a first-class guy and a longtime coach in our district. His presence in the game as a coach will be sorely missed. It was an honour to be part of his final game.”
Top scorers: Loewen (10 points, six rebounds), Terris (10 points, three assists, three steals), Doell (nine points, four assists, five steals), Hayman (eight points, seven rebounds, five steals), Devito (five points, four rebounds, four assists) Kayley Davies (five points, four rebounds, four steals).
Pen-Hi is seeded No. 5 for the provincial tournament, March 1-4 at the Langley Event Centre.
Pen-Hi gets a bye into the second round and will face the winner of the Mt. Baker versus Panorama first-round game. The Lakers lost by two points to Panorama at the recent Kelowna Sweet-16 tournament.
“We’ve got a challenging draw, but by the time that you get to the top-16 at provincials there aren’t any weak teams,” said Terris.
“On a positive, there’s quite a few teams on our side of the draw that we’ve already played this year, including Whistler — a potential second-round opponent — and Kelowna. There’s something reassuring about being familiar with teams.”
The Lakers are 25-5 overall on the season.