A fourth-place finish isn’t quite what teams want when they host a tournament, but that’s just where the St. Mary Sharks senior boys basketball team ended up over the weekend.
Hosting and competing in the 2013 edition of the W.J. Kallal Memorial tournament, the Sharks posted a record of 1-2 to come in fourth, punctuated by a narrow loss to Evansburg in the third-place game.
“We lost a heartbreaker, 53-52,” said coach Darcy Romanuik on Sunday. “It was an exciting game, and we probably deserved a better fate.”
Romanuik explained the Sharks had led most of the game, but in the later stages the shots stopped dropping and the boys ran out of gas, allowing Evansburg to eke out the victory.
Despite losing, he said it was a good effort by the Sharks, especially against a team as strong as Evansburg.
“It’s good to see (that effort), because that team’s a favourite to win the North Central zone championship at our level,” he said.
St. Mary opened the tournament with a strong, 68-34 win over Holy Redeemer’s junior varsity team.
“We kind of had our way with them quite well,” Romanuik said.
That strong start gave the boys confidence moving forward, but their roll was stopped in their second game against J.R. Robson from Vermilion.
That game ended in a 77-55 loss against the provincially ranked 2A school.
“We hung in there with them,” Romanuik said, adding he told his players to try and match the effort of their opponents.
“I think we did that, however their skill level was just a little better that day,” said the coach.
Although the Sharks finished out of the medals, Romanuik said he was pleased with the team’s performance all weekend.
“We’re headed in the right direction to where we want to be, but we’re not quite there yet,” he said.
“As long as we continue to improve and put the time and effort in at practices to get better, I’m hoping good things will happen.”
Up next for the Sharks on their road to the zone tournament in about a month is a trip to Edson on Feb. 15-16 to participate in the Holy Redeemer tournament.
