South Hill Royal Falcons Use Three Pointers To Power Comeback Win
Story and Photos By Robert Thomas
On paper the combined Cornerstone Christian School and Riverview Collegiate junior boys basketball team is known as the Cornerstone Christian School Falcons but in reality they are the South Hill Royal Falcons.
The same could be said about the first half scoresheet from last night’s junior boys high school basketball game.
The first half statistics looked like a potential rout was underway but the once inevitable stats were rewritten.
The second half saw the South Hill squad use a barrage of three pointers to power past a 14 point deficit to defeat the visiting Caronport Cougars 65 - 51.
South Hill Royal Falcons head coach Kalen Senecal said the second half was key to the win.
“I think we played really well in the second half. We made adjustments and our boys played really well to see how the game was unfolding and stay composed down the stretch. I was really proud of them with that,” Senecal said.
Asked about the team's come from behind win and how three pointers were key to the Royal Falcons passing the Cougars and never looking back at the 8:00 minute mark of the fourth quarter he said it was all about execution.
“At the end of the day it’s all about executing our offense. When we are able to keep the ball moving and the ball and the ball touches a lot of our hands we can really see how that pays in making good shots and making three pointers and getting to the rim. And that's something we stress everyday at practice.”
Senecal said being a Junior Varsity team (players from Grade Nine to Grade Twelve) was a good thing as it gave smaller schools with fewer players to chose from a leveler playing field to compete from.
“We hope to be a competitive team. Our goal is to advance to regionals in the 3A provincial playoffs and after that anything can happen.”
The team was hopeful to be competitive in the league and there were two new teams - Notre Dame and Lumsden this year.
“The competition is stiff but it is a fun year to begin in 2022-2023,” he said.
He said about the Junior Varsity designed league where smaller schools for students Grade Nine through Grade Twelve to compete against similar schools.
“We wouldn’t be able to compete against other schools like Moose Jaw Central Collegiate or Peacock on a day on and day out basis but this allows everyone to have a level playing field for them when they are out on the court.”
The team has seven Grade Tens who played last season and only one Grade Twelve student which Senecal sees as the team only getting better in future years.
Perry Martens head coach of the Caronport Cougars said the game was one of two different Caronport teams showing up - the first half team and the second half team.
“Our boys played a good first half. I’m not sure defensively or offensively we stayed true what got us that lead at half time,” Martens said, adding “all credit to Moose Jaw Cornerstone they came put and played all inspired. We let them get away with some jump shots and they’re a good shooting team.”
The first half saw what could be best described as an almost flawlessly executed first half by the Cougars where they dominated play.
To a second half when they seemed to lose their initial cohesiveness.
“We're starting to figure out defensively to get the stops that we want and get ahead with our shooters. But that second half was the opposite of what we wanted to see happen.”
The first half the Cougars looked unstoppable.
“I thought we were going to wi decisively as well but we'll go back and work on it in practice and take some time to figure out how to come out in the second half like we did our first,” Martens said.
Asked about what he saw coming up for the Cougars thuis year he said the potential to grow is large as long as they can stay healthy.
“We have 16 kids a lot of them new to basketball so there is a lot of growth that needs to happen. We have been hit with a lot of illness and injury so there is a lot of building and culturewe want to see happen. The kind of defense we want to see happen hopefully translates into some good offense for us.”
Asked about an incident where a Royal Falcon player was hurt and down for a few minutes and everyone - all players and fans from both teams - all cheered his getting up Martens said that was how the game should be played.
“We want to compete hard. Our guys want to win but at the end of the day there are bigger things than winning. Winning the right way and losing the right way, taking care of opponents and respect for them is something we want to see. It is great to see that on the other side as well.”
It’s a sentiment carried by the Royal Falcons coach as well.
“Sportsmanship is something we really pride in ourselves here in Moose Jaw and it is great to see everyone support a young man after he has been winded or knocked down.”
For Martens he was grateful and happy to see two out of three local news sources show up to cover the game and thanked them for their efforts.
