The Brantford Collegiate Institute Mustangs defeated the St. John’s College Green Eagles 46-40 on Thursday night to earn a spot in the senior boys high school basketball championship game.
The Mustangs will take on the North Park Collegiate Trojans, who defeated Caledonia’s McKinnon Park Secondary School Blue Devils 65-29 in the other semifinal game Thursday.
The Athletic Association of Brant, Haldimand and Norfolk senior boys championship game will be played at Assumption College School on Tuesday with tip-off at 7:30 pm
In an intensely competitive and highly entertaining game, the Mustangs trailed the Green Eagles 23-19 after the first half. In the third quarter, SJC came out strong, led by Liam Granasiuk, who scored two three-pointers..
At the end of three quarters, the Green Eagles led 38-29.
But the Mustangs, who had played strong defense all game, found a way to tighten up even more to mount a fourth-quarter comeback. BCI held SJC to only a couple of points in the fourth quarter. On the offensive end, the Mustangs got a strong effort from Justin Fairfax, Quincy Bowen, Carter Bagshaw and Emery Bouk.
“The first quarter we started off kind of slow,” Bowen said following the game. “In the second quarter, we came out and started making some shots.
“We played amazing defense and that is what got us back in the game.”
Bowen scored nine points for the Mustangs and defensively had at least a couple of blocked shots.
But it was the defensive effort in the final quarter that made the difference, he said.
“We brought a lot of energy to the fourth quarter and we really played hard,” Bowen said. “We held them to just two points.”
The Mustangs were led in scoring by Fairfax with 17 and Bouk with 12.
Granasiuk led the Eagles with 13 points, while Justin Taylor got seven and Ronan Vezsenyi hit for six.
“They played really hard on defence,” Vezsenyi said.
“It was a really physical game. We played tough, we played hard but the shots just weren’t going in.”
In the other semifinal, North Park was led by Conor Oliver with 16 points, Tariq Hamed with 15 and Kostas Poulimenos with nine. The leading scorers for McKinnon Park were Alex Regneres, who got 10, Quinn Cacilhas with eight and Adam Fitzhenry with five.
In the junior boys semifinals Thursday, BCI defeated SJC 59-32, while Assumption beat McKinnon Park 56-51.
The championship game will be played at BCI on Tuesday at 5 pm
For BCI, Brandon Britton scored 20 points, Evan Ireland had 15 and Grayson Young had five. The Green Eagles were led in scoring by Blake Krukowski with 13, Sanjay Mattu 7 and Nathan Bernardo with seven.
Leading scorers were not available for the other semifinal match.
There will be an entry free for those planning to attend Tuesday’s championship games.
Students will be charged $2, adults $3 and families $5. Proceeds will go support high school athletics.
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