The Cedar Community Secondary School Spartans senior girls’ basketball team picked a great time to start winning.
Ladysmith Secondary School (LSS) hosted a senior girls’ basketball tournament Jan. 18 and 19, and coming into the tournament, the Spartans hadn’t won a game. But over the course of the two-day tournament, they won three games to finish second to Shawnigan Lake School.
Shawnigan won the tournament with a 4-0 record, while the Spartans were second after going 3-1. The Duncan Christian School Chargers took third place with a 2-2 record, while the Highland Secondary School Raiders were fourth after going 1-3, and the LSS 49ers went 0-4 to finish fifth.
In finishing second, Cedar defeated Ladysmith 78-32, beat Highland 70-29, defeated Duncan Christian School 53-45 and lost 53-52 to Shawnigan. Marika Grubac was the Spartans’ top scorer against Ladysmith (24 points), Highland (24 points) and Shawnigan (22 points), while Stefanie Talboys was the team’s top scorer against Duncan Christian School with 18 points.
Katelyn Horsley was Ladysmith’s top scorer against Cedar with 13 points. She also picked up 14 points in a 60-26 loss to Shawnigan. Ladysmith rounded out the tournament with a 79-18 loss to Duncan Christian School and a 37-18 loss to Highland.
LSS coach Dan Vincent was happy with his team’s play during the tournament.
“There’s been a lot of improvement in my team over the last month or so,” he said. “My girls showed a lot of intensity and a lot of heart in our games; there was no giving up at all in our games.”
Vincent says one of the highlights for his team was being able to play in front of a big crowd on Friday afternoon.
“For our team to get a chance to play in front of 300 to 400 people in their first game on Friday, the girls really enjoyed that,” he said.
Vincent says it was nice to see teams from as far north as Comox and as far south as Shawnigan come together for the tournament.
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Tournament All-Stars
• Ladysmith Secondary School: April Van Pelt
• Cedar Community Secondary School: Stefanie Talboys
• Shawnigan Lake School: Casey Crowely
• Duncan Christian School: Rachael Bakker
• Highland Secondary School: McKenzie McLeod