The senior and juvenile boys' basketball teams from Elphinstone and Chatelech saw their seasons come to a close this week.
The Elphi juvenile boys lost in the first round of the Vancouver and District playdowns Monday night 60-51 to the Richmond Colts.
After losing out in the North Shore playoffs, the Cougars qualified for the playdowns after beating St. Thomas Aquinas 53-35 on Feb. 16. That earned the Cougars the third North Shore seed.
This year marked the second straight year the Cougars have qualified for the Vancouver and District playdowns under head coach Denis Turenne. The Cougars qualified last year in the bantam division.
"The STA game was a great effort - everyone contributed," said Turenne. "Losing to Richmond Monday night was not exactly the ending we had hoped for; however, they had a great year. I'm so proud of all of them."
In senior action, after beating Elphi on Feb. 10, Chatelech closed out the regular season with two losses - 77-50 to Seycove on Feb. 11 and 88-65 to Sutherland on Feb. 14.
Going into the playoffs, Chat coach Sean Smith said tight defensive play would be the key to success; unfortunately, that key didn't turn as Chat was bounced in the first round 65-53 to Collingwood on Feb. 17.
Chat was victimized on the boards in the second half and only received one hot scoring game from Connor Weatherston who poured in 24, including 16 in the first half. Chat was up eight going into the second quarter, but Collingwood applied a full court press that the Eagles just couldn't break down.
"We had some trouble beating it, which gave them life," Smith said. "Then they started hitting the boards hard and we didn't respond well. It was disappointing because this was a team that we really should have defeated, but they deserved the win. It's hard to admit, but perhaps they wanted it more."
Smith said the loss hurt as he felt the Eagles had a chance to advance much further in the playoffs.
"I liked our chances to get to the final, and even though Sutherland is the elite of the league, we all know anything can happen in a one game playoff," added Smith. "It's a disappointing end to the season, but with the exception of the playoff loss, it was a very good season overall. We had a good team and a lot of positive results. It was rewarding to have this group of players to coach in my final season."
Elphi won their first playoff game on Feb. 17 in thrilling fashion 62-61 over Seycove with the winning shot at the buzzer.
Elphi coach Mike Sopow said the Cougars battled back after going down 17 in the first half.
"We kept with our game plan and kept driving hard at their big guys getting them in foul trouble," said Sopow. "With their big guys out of the game, the momentum changed and we battled back."
With 15 seconds left, Jason Chung hit a layup and was fouled to tie up the game at 59-59. After a time out, Jason came out and knocked down the free throw to put Elphi up one. Seycove's point guard then drove the lane on the next possession and hit a tough reverse layup to put Seycove up 61-60. That set the stage for the dramatic last-minute shot as Elphi ran a sideline play that ended up with Colin McGillivary making a majestic lob to Patrick Ellison for the game-winning layup.
On Monday night, Elphi lost 71-51 to Windsor. Then on Tuesday night, Elphi lost 68-46 to Collingwood to end their season.
"It was a tough season for us with injuries and missing guys. The guys worked hard and the intensity was there, but it was tough because we were always missing two or three key guys," Sopow added. "We said throughout the season, that hopefully when we get to full strength we could show teams that we could be a good team once the playoffs rolled around, and we did show that against Seycove. The way we pulled that one out was great."
