Wins over Calgary schools highlighted the Foothills Falcons exhibition series last week.
The Foothills Composite Falcons boys bucked a recent trend and dispatched William Aberhart with the Falcons girls getting by St. Mary’s as part of the varsity basketball exhibition series played out of the Okotoks gym from Feb. 3-5.
“First and foremost it was nice to get that loss monkey off our back, it’s been a while since we’ve had a win,” said Falcons boys head coach Amron Gwilliam. “We’ve been playing some really tough teams. I think we’ve played 10 of the top 15 ranked teams right now and we haven’t been able to get over that hump.
“That relief of pressure in the guys of not having a win in a longtime was definitely a big deal, but even just realizing that if they play well, play together and compete on the defensive end that we can start to win these games against big Calgary schools and some of those south schools as well.”
Foothills got by Aberhart 72-67 in overtime after the Orange made a late push to force the extra session.
Key Falcons guard Ben Stephan returned from injury in the contest and made a huge impact before fouling out in the fourth quarter, the coach added.
“He played some limited minutes, but I like the way when he brings the ball up for us we just play with a little bit more poise and a little bit more patience,” Gwilliam said.
“We turned it over a few too many times in that fourth quarter and allowed them to tie it up right at the end of the game. In overtime, I thought our guys stepped up and played well, played with better poise and didn’t turn the ball over and Beynon hit two threes late in the shot clock to sort of put the dagger in.”
Foothills closed its three games in three days set in a narrow 70-66 loss to the Lethbridge Collegiate Institute Rams.
“I liked the way our kids worked and showed grit right to the very end and made it a close game throughout,” Gwilliam said. “We got down a bit in the second quarter, I thought we made some nice adjustments at halftime and were able to pull it back in.
“We weren’t quite able to get over the hump, but I was definitely proud of how they played.”
Jack Oliver earned the player of the game nod for Foothills with guard Tyler Olson also nailing some big shots down the stretch and Stephan ably at the controls of the offence up for much of the contest and Beynon Gwilliam rebounding well and putting in a strong defensive effort.
Foothills narrowed the deficit to one point in the final five minutes on a Jon Stephan rebound and put back, but were foiled in the final minutes by an 8-0 run from the visitors.
“We have played in quite a few tight games so we’re starting to learn how to at least keep it close,” Gwilliam added. “It’s showing that our inexperience used to hurt us before and now we’re starting to get that experience and help close out games a bit better.”
Foothills opened the exhibition series on Feb. 3 with a 71-49 loss to Calgary’s Ernest Manning.
“We did not play real well,” the coach said. “We had it within about 13 points with about seven minutes left and just kind of had a collapse in the fourth quarter where they went on a bit of a run and we didn’t respond.”
The Foothills senior girls got off to a dream start to a busy stretch last week.
In exhibition play on Feb. 2, Foothills knocked off the No. 5 ranked Centennial Coyotes by a 77-70 score with Tia Glazier earning player of the game honours.
The Falcons followed it up with another gritty victory in outlasting Calgary’s St. Mary’s 62-57 on Feb. 3 led by Trista Thorn’s player of the game effort.
The Falcons had a tough task with two matches on Feb. 5 at home and dropped the front end of the set by a 64-62 margin to William Aberhart despite a strong effort from Grade 10 player of the game Dior Sellars.
Foothills wrapped up the week with an 85-50 defeat to the Coyotes in the rematch the second match of the day. Guard Faith Hunter was player of the game.
Thorn was dominant all week with an average of 20 points, 10 rebounds and four steals per game, Glazier averaged 12 points, eight rebounds and four steals with Hunter adding an average of 11 points, three assists and three steals.
