WESTLOCK — About a month ago, the R.F. Staples Junior Varsity girls’ basketball team played a match that coach Jaden Kazamer called “one of the most wild games” she had ever been part of: a bronze medal match at the end of a tournament in Cold Lake against the host team.
That match not only ended with the R.F. Staples Thunderbirds winning by a single point, but it also featured a 45-minute delay after a referee suffered a head injury and had to be treated by emergency medical services.
However, that bizarre match was topped by the game that the R.F. Staples JV girls played on March 2 during the gold medal final of the North Central Zones at the Westlock Rotary Spirit Centre.
First off, their match was against the Holy Trinity Academy Tigers, a team that absolutely no one expected to be in the final after their season had been decidedly mixed.
In fact, Edson had been heavily favoured to be in the final, having finished first in the zone among JV girls’ teams and receiving a bye in the first round of March 1-2 tournament.
“We were expecting to play against the (Edson) Pacers, who we’ve lost to twice,” said Kazamer, in an interview following the gold medal match. “But we played against Holy Trinity, which we beat twice before this.”
Secondly, the gold medal match ended up in a 24-24 tie after Westlock sank two penalty shots, forcing both R.F. Staples and Holy Trinity to play an extra five-minute period of overtime to decide the winner — a rarity in a high-scoring sport like basketball.
“This was the first game I've ever participated in that we got into overtime,” said Kazamer.
That final five minutes was an intense affair that saw the Thunderbirds and Tigers trade baskets back and forth until finally, Holy Trinity emerged the victor with a score of 30-28.
“It was an intense game,” said Kazamer. “Honestly, the girls held up their own. They held their heads high the whole time, and even at the end when the buzzer went and we were down by two, they all left with smiles ... on their faces.”
Kazamer said the JV girls played the best they could and knew that if the game had gone their way, they would have earned the win just as much as Holdy Trinity.
Prior to the championship final, the R.F. Staples JV girls played in one other game this weekend, a match against Barrhead Composite High School on Friday afternoon that ended in a 42-28 victory for the T-Birds.
“With them being our arch-nemesis, it was a great time to beat them by a good spread,” said Kazamer, noting that no one on the Westlock team fouled out and just played a good game of basketball.
This unusual draw for the North Central Zones was due largely to the fact that there are only five JV girls’ teams in the zone.
“It’s kind of weird for JV seasons, because we don’t have league games where we get that ranking done,” Kazamer said, noting their ranking is based on wins and losses at tournaments, and they had both against every other team in the zone.
It should be noted that this match ends the R.F. Staples JV girls’ season, as only the winner goes on to provincials.
