Juel girls reach 10 wins
The Niagara Juel girls basketball team completed its regular season with a 10-15 record after winning two of three games this past weekend.
Niagara defeated the St. Lawrence Lightning 50-38, lost 54-53 to the GTA Blues and beat the Thunder Bay Wolves 81-50.
“We had a solid weekend to prepare for the league tournament weekend. We could have had another 3-0 weekend but came up short in our second game,” Niagara head coach Si Khounviseth said. “Overall an outstanding weekend as we accomplished our goal for the year of getting to 10 wins for the season.”
Against St. Lawrence, Niagara built quarter leads of 13-12, 27-22 and 42-29 to record the victory.
“A very sluggish start and overall I just thought we were not sharp. We didn’t compete or play the right way,” he said. “We found a way to win.”
Top performers for Niagara were: Emma Vendittelli (A.N. Myer) with nine points; Keira Teske (Governor Simcoe) with eight points; Alena Tepsic (Saltfleet) with seven points; Reese Bolibruck (West Niagara) with six points and five rebounds; and, Amelia Siolkowsky (E.L. Crossley) with four points and 11 rebounds.
No game sheet was available from the game against the GTA Blues.
Khounviseth was not happy with his team’s play in the loss.
“Our attention to detail and game play for this game was just not there as we lost 54-53 to a team we felt we should have beaten. This game felt like we were back at the start of the season. Unforced turnovers, missed layups and wide open looks. We definitely let this one slip away. As a coach, you sometimes need to let things play out and sometimes losing games like this helps the players to refocus.”
Versus Thunder Bay, Niagara rolled to quarter leads of 17-10, 43-16 and 59-34.
“We came out and played the right way and completed the right way from start to finish. This is a team that had beaten us pretty badly in early January back from the Christmas break,” he said. “It was a great response from the team as we simply just defensively put the clamps on them. We competed and played the right way. We made our layups and open looks.”
Topping the stat sheet for Niagara were: Alyah Pereira (Westdale) with 18 points; Bolibruck with 13 points; Shorleigh Burrows (Eden) and Venditelli with 11 points; Ava Froese (Smithville Christian) with eight points and 11 boards; and, Siolkowsky with six points and 10 rebounds.
The league tournament will be held May 24-26 in Niagara. Niagara opens the tournament May 24 at 1 p.m. at the Beddis Gym No. 2 at Brock versus the Thunder Bay Wolves.
