A second-place finish for the St. Mary Sharks boys basketball team is an impressive result when they’re facing schools twice their size.
Sharks coach Darcy Romanuik said the team was literally one point away from a first-place finish at a Lac La Biche tournament Jan. 10, losing the deciding match to a team from Bonnyville.
“It was 56 all with seven second left, and they went to the line and sunk one of two free throws,” he said. “We ran out of time, thus losing 57-56.”
The four-team tournament didn’t have playoffs, instead just having round-robin play, and that first game of the day was basically the tournament championship match as both team went undefeated for the rest of the day.
Although the win itself would have been the ideal result, the school is larger and plays in a higher zone division than St. Mary so just staying competitive is a great success.
“Bonnyville is a 3A school, so we were pretty happy to almost get the win. That’s a real positive,” Romanuik said.
The second match of the tournament was an easier one for the Sharks. They faced Boyle, another 1A school that they have already faced and beaten this season.
“We handled them fairly easily,” he said. “We beat them 54-35.”
The final match of the day was against the host team from Lac La Biche, another 3A school with a school-size and also a player-size advantage over the Sharks.
“They had three or four guys over six feet, so we knew we were going to have our work cut out for us,” Ronanuik said. “When all was said and done we won 61-58; it was a pretty good basketball game.”
Height is obviously an advantage when it comes to basketball, since a few inches can make the difference in who gets the rebounds, but the Sharks’ work ethic and teamwork ultimately won the game for them.
“Having height is one thing, but how you use that height and your work ethic is another,” Romanuik said.
“I think that made all the difference in the game.”
Having such a strong performance against larger schools that could theoretically blow the 1A Sharks out of the water is a strong indication of what the team is capable of, and Romanuik said he expects a strong performance in terms of zones as the team moves into the second half of the season.
There will be a several-week break in the competitive action as players focus on their semester-end and Diploma exams this month, but the Sharks will get the chance to put their skills to the test in a large 1A tournament scheduled for Jan. 30-31 in Riley and Tofield.
And regardless of the outcome of that game, Romanuik said it’s certain to be an enjoyable experience with a team that’s so easy to coach.
“The work ethic is there, and it’s always fun to watch,” he said. “This team believes as long as there’s a tick on the clock, they can win. It’s really nice to be a part of it.”
