Toilers Senior Boys Looking For E For Effort
Photos and story by Robert Thomas
This season the Peacock Toilers senior boys basketball team sports a lot of talent.
The Toilers are running a team with six returnees and six new players joining the team.
“We don’t really look at the grades our guys are in tryouts come out we see who came out and pick our team from there,” Toilers head coach Troy Setter said.
Setter said he doesn’t go out and recruit players but selects his team from the guys who show up for tryouts.
The bench is full this season. The fuller bench helps build the team for next season.
“We kept 13 (players) this year which is more than usual. We usually keep about 11 (players). We know we have six or seven players graduating so we wanted to keep a couple of grade elevens around so they can get some reps in so they will be ready to go for next year,” he said.
The senior boys Toilers has something the senior girls teams do not have and that is an abundance of people trying to make the team. All three senior city senior girls teams find themselves with short benches of only ten girls on the team.
“We had 24 kids come out this year so there was lot of kids out. It was tough to make some of the cuts we made. But it was good to see the number of kids that came out,” Setter said.
Asked about rebuilding the program for next year Setter said “you always have to try to the kids out there when you can.”
It has been a tradition that may of the players who do not make the senior boys team end up on the school’s Junior Varsity or JV team. But this year there is no boys JV team at Peacock. Players who did not make the cut have no team to play on.
The Toilers sport likely the best player in the league - as well as top ten rated player provincially - in the extremely talented Makungu Mutabazi.
Setter said that there is a bit of a change in Mutabazi’s game this season as he moves into a different emphasis in his game.
“Makungu he is a special kid he works hard on the court and off court. He obviously has got a lot of skills but you can’t just have one guy to do things. And he is got the right attitude where he knows he has got to use his teammates and they have to use him well. They are playing well together. He is looking to get more assists than he is getting points ad he is doing a great job with it this year.”
During Thursday afternoon’s scrimmage Mutabazi made several successful plays to set up teammates to make a basket.
On defence during the scrimmage Mutabazi made many plays blocking opponents as well as successfully grabbing rebounds.
“He should be (good on defence) he is long and he is lengthy and he is athletic so he had better be there on defence,” he said.
But Mutabazi is not the only player on the Toilers with many returnees and new players expected to excel on the court.
The Toilers have the same goals every season.
“We are just looking for them to lead. As far as what we are looking for team wise our goals are always the same. Our goals are alway the same. It doesn’t matter what we have or who we have our goal is always to be in the city final game. And our goals are to make to make Hoopla. These are the goals we set every year.”
Hoopla is the annual provincial high school basketball championship tournament.
What the Toilers coaching staff is looking for out of their players can be summed up to one word.
“What are we looking for in our players. Effort. They have to be willing to come out and play hard,” Setter said.
The Toilers find themselves in 5A from 4A last season due to increased enrolment at Peacock Collegiate. The level of play is determined by the size of the student body and is seen as way of equalizing the drawing power teams have with a large student body.
Peacock Toilers head coach Troy Setter (right) entered the scrimmage after one of the players suffered a minor injury
Setter is philosophical when it comes to the move to 5A this season.
“There is a lot of big problems in 5A. It’s a challenge though it is good. I am sure people are getting sick of Central and Peacock play in the 4A (provincial) final.”
About the competition the Toilers will face he would not speculate where the Toilers will end up in Hoopla’s 5A competition.
“We will take it one game at a time when we get up to those finals.”
The Toilers have a lot of work ahead of them as only two rural teams make it into Hoopla.
“We’ve got our work cut out for us if we want to be one of the two (rural) teams that makes it there (to Hoopla).”
The Toilers will be able to get a taste of playing 5A ball in the Moose Jaw city league and improving as powerhouse Swift Current is a 5A team. Swift Current is in its second season in the Moose Jaw league.
“We haven’s seen them this year yet. But I know we had some good battles with them last year. They beat us once and then we beat them in the semi-final game there so I’m really looking forward to playing them.”
Makungu Mutabazi is one of the returning grade twelve players the Toilers are looking for leadership
“It’s better (to play top teams). If you do things right it will improve you. If you are taking things easy and not doing the little things you are not going to improve no matter who you are playing,” he said.
Setter said it is great to see the senior boys league expand this season. Two new senior boys teams have enter the league with the arrival of the South Hill Royal Falcons (a combined Cornerstone Christian School and Riverview Collegiate) and the Notre Dame Hounds.
Last season the Royal Falcons and the Hounds played in the JV league.
“You need to have teams. I always believe we should have senior teams and junior teams and Vanier, Cornerstone and Riverview all of those teams they are 4A and 3A playing against the bigger schools it should be good for them. It should help them learn,” Settter said, adding “when they get their chance to play at Hoopla they are better for it because they played better teams.”
The Toilers senior boys are considered a city league favourite this season.
