As the road to this year’s Hoopla tournament winds along, the North Battleford Comprehensive High School Vikings senior girls’ basketball team has a better idea of where they stand in the provincial 4A mix.
The Vikings finished in third place in the Viking Invitational tournament over the weekend, as they defeated the Melfort Comets to capture a bronze medal Saturday afternoon.
“It was a huge weekend for us as we got to play a number of 4A and 5A teams,” Vikings head coach Bryan Cottini said.
“We didn’t get into the gold medal game, but the silver lining is that by beating Melfort, we may have vaulted them in the race to get a top overall seed at the provincials.”
The Vikings eight-point win over the Comets came after they fell by two points in the semifinals earlier in the day to the Estevan Elecs.
The Elecs would lose the championship game to the Prince Albert Carlton Crusaders Saturday night.
“The game with Estevan was close right until the end,” Cottini said. “Our MVP from last season and our best three-point shooter Mia Cottini has been out with an injury since January, so as a result of that a lot of teams are packing the key on defence and forcing us to shoot more from the outside without her in the lineup, and that was the difference in that game.
“Melfort was doing that to us early on in the bronze medal game, then for whatever reason they decided to switch to a man defence, and that played right to our advantage. We had a couple of starters foul out in the last couple of minutes and Melfort did a great job of pressuring us late, but we were able to hang on for the win.”
The Vikings advanced to the playoffs with a pair of round-robin wins Friday afternoon over the Meadow Lake Spartans and the Swift Current Ardens.
“We got out to a quick lead against Meadow Lake and were in control of that game, but it was only a four-point game against Swift Current after the first two quarters,” Cottini said.
“To be honest, I wasn’t feeling too comfortable at that point in the game, but we started to turn things around in the third and fourth quarter and we never looked back.”
As the Vikings gear up for a tournament hosted by Prince Albert Carlton in two weeks, coach Cottini is happy to see how the team is progressing.
“When Mia got hurt, I wasn’t sure how the girls were going to respond to losing the team captain, but they’ve stepped up and we’ve beat a number of strong teams,” Cottini said.
“It will take a little bit to get everyone back gelling in their regular roles when she returns, but getting her back will put our team’s potential through the roof.”
This year’s Hoopla tournament will take place in Regina from March 23-25, with the Peacock Toilers of Moose Jaw having won the last three 4A girls’ provincial titles.
The Vikings finished in fourth place last year as they dropped a 59-51 affair to the Vanier Spirits from Moose Jaw.
