Sea-hawks’ playoff opponents settled
Memorial men will face Acadia in quarter-finals, women taking on Cape Breton
The Memorial Sea-hawks men’s basketball team will play the Acadia Axemen, and the women’s hoops squad will battle the Cape Breton University Capers next weekend in the Atlantic University Sport (AUS) quarter-finals in Halifax.
The 2016-17 AUS regular season in basketball clewed up over the weekend for both teams in Wolfville, N.S., against Acadia, with the men settling for a split, while the Lady Birds dropped both games to the Axewomen.
Memorial’s men’s squad enjoyed their best season in 15 years, finishing 12-8 and fourth in the conference. The Lady Birds were 11-9 and sixth in the standings.
The Sea-hawks men’s squad enters the post-season winners of three of its last four starts, and is 6-6 since the Christmas break. The road has not been kind to Memorial, however, as the Sea-hawks are 3-7 away from the Field House.
The weekend series with the fifth-place Axemen (10-10) was the only meeting of the season between the two universities, making each game worth four points. The Sea-hawks lost Friday’s game 97-82, but rebounded with an 84-74 victory Saturday night.
It was the final regular-season game of Vasilije Curcic’s Sea-hawks career, and the big Serbian delivered a 27-point, 14-rebound game.
Curcic finishes third on Memorial’s all-time scoring list with 1,410 career points. Jeff Saxby is No. 1 on the list with 1,452, with Peter Benoite, the current Sea-hawks coach, No. 2 at 1,429. Curcic finished second in conference scoring this season, averaging 20 points per game. UPEI Panthers star Tyler Scott won the scoring title with a 21.56 points-per-game average.
Rookie Nathan Barker of Corner Brook, a 6-4 guard who appears to be well on his way to a fine Sea-hawks’ career, had 12 points. Barker averaged 8.4 points-per-game this season.
Fifth-year Jacob Hynes, out of Holy Heart of Mary in St. John’s, closed out his career at Memorial with an 11-point effort. Greg Manual of Dartmouth, N.S., also scored 12 points.
The Sea-hawks pulled away from the Axemen in the third quarter Saturday, outscoring Acadia 27-13.
Friday night, Curcic was the high scorer for the Sea-hawks with 22 points. Daniel Gordon, who finished 10th in conference scoring (15.8 ppg), scored 20 points. Gordon, a guard from Ajax, Ont., enters his fifth season next year. Barker scored 15 points.
Memorial was outscored 26-11 in the first quarter, and couldn’t rebound from the slow start.
The two losses to Acadia cooled off a red-hot Lady Birds team that was 8-2 since the Christmas break. Memorial had a rough start to the season, going 2-5 before turning things around.
It was during the early part of the season the Sea-hawks hooked up with the Capers, losing both games back in midnovember at the Field House by 76-71 and 82-71 scores.
This past weekend, Memorial dropped a 77-61 decision to Acadia Friday night before losing 83-72 Saturday.
Friday, Sydney Stewart, just as she’s done all season, paced the Sea-hawks with 18 points. Stewart, a third-year guard from Sarnia, Ont., was third in conference scoring with 15.6 points per game.
Acadia’s Paloma Anderson won the scoring crown with 22.8 ppg. Rookie Grace Diazbrito from the Canary Islands scored 17 points and grabbed 11 rebounds for the Sea-hawks. Diaz-brito averaged 7.8 boards this year.
Saturday night, Stewart was the top point-getter with 16 points. Rosie Stanoev netted 13 points and Brooklynn Wright netted 10.
Quarter-finals are slated for Friday at the Scotiabank Centre in downtown Halifax. The women play 3:30 p.m. (NL time), while the men’s game is set for 7 p.m. (NL time). All games are available via webcast at www. Austv.ca.