The St. Mary Girls basketball team was shutout at the home-hosted Cathy Mitchell Cup over the weekend, where the team finished in last place.
Despite the outcome of the games, coach Peter Molesky said he was happy with the way the team performed, citing “amazing” improvements.
“We didn’t have any victories, but we got some good results,” he said. “I’m very pleased with the general improvement and the attitude of the team.”
The Sharks went into the tournament as the last-place team and faced the first-place team from St. Thomas Aquinas right out of the gates.
St. Thomas Aquinas dominated the court from start to finish, managing to beat the Sharks 67-26.
“They had beaten us quite badly a week ago Monday and they didn’t beat us as badly this time,” Molesky said. “At least we were in the game and capable of doing something.”
He said although the team didn’t win the game, the players demonstrated significant improvement, which helped boost their confidence levels heading into the rest of the tournament.
The Sharks lost the next match against Millwoods Christian School, but were able to narrow the gap significantly to just five points for a final score of 55-50.
“We played very well. We had an opportunity to win,” he said. “This time around, we earned our points and played better basketball.”
Molesky said it was disappointing to lose that game as he felt the Sharks outplayed Millwoods.
The loss sent the team battling for seventh place against Fort Saskatchewan. A close game ended in defeat, with Fort Saskatchewan edging ahead of the Sharks 45-42.
“In both games what really hurt us in the last quarter was our inability to finish it up,” he said. “I am convinced that we could have won either of those games.”
A major difficulty leading up to the tournament was getting certain players to attend practice, Molesky said, adding he hopes that changes in the next two weeks as the team prepares for zones.
“It was more about our own failings compared to the doings of the other teams,” he said. “We had some issues with integrating our plays and defence and there wasn’t really much we could do about it.”
The Sharks are set to host an exhibition game against Barrhead on Monday, Feb. 27 before heading into zones March 9-10.
