Mustangs hoping for hoops championship
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Brantford Collegiate Institute’s senior boys basketball team will have a good idea where it stands in the Brant County high school league when the Christmas break starts.
BCI played St. John’s College on Tuesday, scoring a 67-56 victory against the Green Eagles. If the Mustangs can post wins on Thursday against Paris District High School and next Tuesday at Assumption College, they will find themselves on top of the league.
“We’ve seen Assumption,” said BCI coach Pete Lovett, whose team lost 66-60 to ACS in the first game of the regular season.
“We were down three starters against Assumption. I’d like to see how we do full strength against them.”
Playing full strength has been an issue this season for the Mustangs. For various reasons, BCI has been without players in every game it’s played.
“Basketball wise I’m happy,” said Lovett, whose team is 3-1 this season in league play. “We have an experienced group that knows what to expect of me and I know what to expect of them.
“The only frustrating part is we have still yet to play a game with our whole roster. I’m looking forward to that day.”
BCI got off to a strong start this season, winning the Stratford Northwestern tournament in November. The Mustangs followed that up with a consolation championship at a tournament in Kingston last weekend.
“It was a great weekend,” said Lovett. “Every single game we played was tight.
“They’ve got good basketball there. It was a lot of good basketball being played.”
Lovett said one of the things his team got out of the Kingston tournament was learning to close out three-point shooters. He’s hoping the experience has made his players tougher defensively, something he wants to see them improve on as the second half of the season gets going.
“I have three or four strong defenders at any given time and I’m looking for five,” Lovett said.
“That seems to let us down, that fifth guy coming in and not being able to keep his man in front of him.
“As well, our defensive rebounding can be suspect at times.”
Lovett has a team he’s extremely excited about. The team is led by a group of Grade 12 and fifth-year players including Jaidyn Hayes, Marcus Cohoon, Spencer Johnson, Donnie Johnson, Ty Easton, Evan Easton, Nash Evans, Luke Yuhasz, Aidan Vachon and Matthew Phillips.
Grade 11s Richard Spencer-Raymond, Jascon Estoesta and Aidan Salole will also contribute.
“We have height, we have speed, we have scoring and we have defence,” Lovett said. “This is a team I’ve been looking forward to coaching for a while.”
And the league seems like it’s up for grabs after being dominated by North Park Collegiate for the past few years.
“It’s a different league this year,” said Lovett. “It’s not as top heavy as it has been in the last two or three years so your playoff seed isn’t the upmost important thing.
“If you told me any of the top-four teams would win the (county) championship, I wouldn’t be surprised.”
While the Mustangs are still trying to find themselves, Lovett can already picture how things can turn out. He feels his team is coming on strong and he’s really happy.
“I think depth is going to come into play a little bit more this year, making sure that you have seven, eight or nine guys, guys who can come in and contribute off the bench,” he said.
“We’re excited to be in the mix but at the same time, we’re wanting to come out on top. We are playing for a (county) championship this year.”
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