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Scott Witcher

Trojans nab silver on home court

The Cinderella story came up forty minutes short.

The SAIT men’s basketball team snagged a silver medal as hosts of the 2010 CCAA National Championship after a fantastic two-night run.

The seventh-seeded Trojans – wearing green jerseys in tribute to the 1986 national championship team all weekend – first faced the second ranked Humber Hawks from Etobicoke, Ont.

Led by tournament all-stars Emmanuel Chiek and Keenan Milburn, the Trojans captured a quick 23-11 first-quarter lead and held on to upset the Ontario provincial champions by seven points.

“In a tournament of this calibre, you have to play forty minutes and we let up for a few,” said SAIT coach Greg Stevens. “They really forced their will, but lucky for us, we had a big enough lead that we could absorb it.”

Stevens said the key in the first half came from the players moving the ball and their bodies well.

“We talked about doing what we do. The beauty of this team is that we don’t have to really change much. Emmanuel stepped up huge, Keenan hit some big shots and we iced our free throws at the end.”

Forward Fabian Warner jammed his finger on a play and was removed from the game. He would later find out he had a double dislocation of his finger, as well as a hernia. But he played the rest of the tournament.

In the semifinal, SAIT came up against the Champlain Cavaliers from St-Lambert, Que. They had previously upset NAIT to reach this point.

The Trojans held on to win 69-67 and earn the first medal at a national tournament since 1996.

Milburn came up big again with nine of his 18 points coming in the final quarter.

“Before this tournament, I told Keenan: ‘Your moment, it’s been two-and-a-half years in the making, and now we’re going to try to ride you all the way to the championship,’ ” said SAIT head coach Mike Stevens.

Warner said afterwards that SAIT’s zone defence gave Champlain a lot of trouble.
“We were active and everyone was talking on the floor. Everyone really wanted this one. We felt something slipped away from us at the ACAC finals (bronze medal) so we wanted this one a lot more to make up for that.”

Champlain’s Adam Chmiel-ewski missed an inside shot with 17 seconds left and SAIT leading 69-67. SAIT’s Milburn and Warner missed two free throws apiece in the final 10 seconds. With no time on the clock, Cavalier Simon Bibeau clanked a three-point attempt off the rim.

“It’s unbelievable, is what it is,” said Stevens. “The guys gutted it out. At halftime, when it was 33-33, we talked about how it was a zero-zero game, in a national semifinal in our gym, with 20 minutes left – and how we needed to go out and get it.”

The final step was to face the top-seeded University of Northern British Columbia Timberwolves from Prince George.

The national championship game came in front of a sold-out Campus Centre gym as the red and white of SAIT was almost matched by the yellow and green throng of fans who made the nine-hour trip from UNBC.

The T-Wolves led by 27 at halftime and took the match 96-63 in a completely dominating performance.

“Being on the losing end of this game is tough,” said Stevens.

“But like I said to the guys, they won the silver medal last night. Tonight was a chance to earn gold. It didn’t go our way, but we’ve still got to be proud of what we accomplished this year.”

Stephen Olivier-Job had his biggest performance of the tournament with 12 points, two shy of Milburn.

“Everybody said that we were going to play one game and get out of here. We made it to the final instead,” Olivier-Job said. “It’s a huge achievement. We put SAIT back on the map.”

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