McCallion
Quest

McCallion's Boys Sr. Basketball

By Jacob Younan

Over the past few years the McCallion boy's basketball teams, have had a reputation of being the best. Last year, the seniors dominated competition finishing with a 10-1 record and went on to become the South Peel champions. The juniors also dominated their tournament, winning every game by an average of 26 points. The future looked bright and with Nathan Carter returning to the point guard position this year, the team had a chance to repeat as champions.

In the Thomas Street pre-season Invitational tournament, the boys set out to start the season on the right foot. They did just that, winning all 4 games handily, without breaking a sweat, and claimed the tournament title. This was just one of their goals this year. The team seems determined, as ever to live up to their potential, the one that all McCallion sports teams have always demonstrated. The season schedule was now on the horizon…with cross town rivals Dolphin the first to face the defending champs.

Tuesday the 14th of January was actually an odd day for the team. After the school bell had rung, signalling the end of the school day, the boys were ready for action when their game would commence an hour later at 3:30pm. After the gym became prepared the team headed down to the locker room, and got ready to play, what they hoped would be victorious start to the season. Unfortunately it seemed like the Dolphin team was running late. As the time passed, minute-by-minute, a suspicion arose that perhaps there had been a mistake. And indeed there was. For some odd reason, the McCallion coaching staff had misread the schedule. The misinterpretation was that the boys weren't actually playing at home; they were supposed to be playing on the Dolphin home court. When the news was delivered to the players, they rushed to collect their coats and hopped into the cars of the coaches and headed off to Dolphin quickly. 

Finally, after all the commotion was over, and with no warm up to speak of, the game began. The starting line-up for HMC walked onto the floor and the referee tossed up the tip-off. Dolphin collected the ball from the tip and went in for an easy lay-up. Even though Dolphin struck first, it didn't seem to bother the McCallion players, as the very next play, Nathan Carter swooped to the basket and scored. From then on, the HMC team just continued to do things right. One of their strongest points was their ability to make Dolphin turn the ball over repeatedly. In practice that week, they had just learned a full court press and put it into action right away. After letting Dolphin trade baskets with them, HMC stepped up their defensive pressure and began to protect the basket.

 As the game progressed it seemed that McCallion was just pulling away, bit by bit. When the halftime buzzer went off, the score was 22-13 in favour of HMC. But the mood on the McCallion bench did not necessarily reflect happiness. Coach Riddell and Scuccato were extremely frustrated at the fact that the team was only up by 9 points. In the minds of the coaches, 9 points was not nearly enough. With the shots missed, the repeated turnovers and the lack of execution on offense, the coaches knew that McCallion was not playing to their potential. After seeing the Dolphin team, the coaches expected a 30 point lead, they did not expect to be hanging on by 9 points at half.

During their half time speech, the coaches preached tighter defense, and a defense that emphasized being able to stay in front of their man. As well as the fact that the defense needed to improve, the coaches also reminded the players about good execution and concentration on the offensive end. It seemed that every time there was an open lay-up it was somehow missed. To improve this attribute, the squad worked on lay-ups during the majority of the half-time break. 

When all was said and done, the second half commenced and the Hazel McCallion team came out with a blistering level of intensity. Their full-court press was ruthless, and the lay-ups were beginning to drop. The offense was being executed to near perfection, and slowly, as the half went on, the Dolphin team was left in the dust. When the lead began to increase, the coaches became more comfortable with using their bench players. After giving most of the starting line-up a break, the substitutes carried the load quite well, and even started their own run. 9 minutes into the second half, the game was history. By the end of the game the McCallion team had only allowed a total of 3 points in the entire second half. Led by 16 points from Homelands transfer Mohammed Habibzi and 15 points from Ashton Graham, HMC roared away to a  47-17 pummelling of Dolphin. Even though the victory was won by 30-points, the coaching staff and the players knew that it could have been much more, had they played with such intensity for all 40 minutes of that game.   

Hazel’s next opponent is Edenwood, a team that has notoriously given the Hurricanes trouble. In the Thomas Street tournament, the boys from Hazel handled Edenwood well, winning 46-20, however the Edenwood coach has promised a closer game this time around. Stay tuned.