In a word, wow!
Maybe the best word to describe the first match-up between the Central Centurions and St. Joseph’s Jaguars in Grade 8 Girls basketball play Friday at Central, where two evenly-matched teams slugged it out, before Central took a 34-30 final score in their favour.
For an hour, two teams that had never met before tipped off and went about the process of executing all that stuff that they’d worked on in practice. And what a treat it turned out to be.
Make no mistake, in the early going, it was all Central. The Centurions took advantage of the Jaguars early, as St. Joe’s had difficulty cementing their 2-1-2 zone. The result was, predictably, a tilted floor, as the Blue Shirts buzzed the Jaguar zone, scoring early and often, and giving the appearance that they intended to make the game the longest hour possible for the girls from St. Joe’s. A brief rally towards the end of the second half was encouraging for the Jags, but still, the half-time scoreboard posted a pretty bleak 26-12 score in favour of the home side.
The Jaguars, though, entered the second half of the contest an entirely different team, riding a new defensive look that turned things around dramatically. St. Joe’s came out of the break with a 2-3 pressure trap that seemed to catch Central off-guard, and by the half-way point of the second half, the Lady Cats had made it a much tighter contest, bringing the score to 28-26, going on a 14-2 run over an 8 minute chunk of the second half.
Central, in the final moments of the game, was able to produce a 6-4 run over the Jaguars, giving them the decisive margin with which they ended the game.
From the perspective of our team, it was a tremendous experience, with all sorts of experience that can only be learned, honestly, in the heat of the action. And from a coaching point of view, there’s no question there is plenty to be pleased with as a result of this game.
Central, I believe, won the tournament last year, We ran them into a two-possession game on their own floor.
Although we fell apart due to jitters in the first half, we were able to adjust our game, and re-gain our composure, enough to make this a really close game. I mean, maybe this is a little cheesy, but we did out-point our opponents 18-8 in the second half. Surely that means something, and whatever it means, it’s a good thing.
Our 2-3 defense was very good. No doubt, it was the difference-maker for this game. It wasn’t so great the last time out, so to see it have the effect it did made everyone realize how important it is to have several different looks defensively.
Another effective look we utilized was the extended 2-1-2. We used this for the first time tonight, and had never practiced it. We were haphazard in application, but once we started to get a better feel for it, the defense resulted in several turnovers that worked to our advantage.
Our inbounds need to better, plain and simple. There’s an app for that. We should use it.
All together, the game resulted in an extremely happy coaching staff. We were able to roll everyone onto the floor, and everyone got plenty of minutes. Plus, we took the defending champs right to the final whistle.
Nothing short of a job well-done.
