The Ontario Colleges Athletic Association women’s basketball championship tournament will be held from Feb. 28 to March 2 at the new St. Lawrence College gymnasium in Kingston.
The $30-million, state-of-the-art facility officially opened last November.
The St. Lawrence Vikings (6-11) will play Fanshawe in a sudden-death quarterfinal.
The Falcons from London sport a record of 20-1 and are currently the No. 1-ranked team in Canada.
“We have nothing to lose and everything to gain,” said Vikings guard Rachel Steer.
The team’s leading scorer looks forward to pulling off one of the biggest upsets in OCAA history.
“If we play our game, we should be able to give the Falcons a competitive match,” continued Steer, a second-year fitness and health promotion student from Markham.
“They’re going to come out really hard. We need to adapt to whatever they throw at us. I have a good feeling that we’re going to play our best game of the season. We’ll have to beat Fanshawe. They’re a really good team.”
Vikings head coach Remy Simpson knows the cards are stacked against them. The OCAA’s 2017 Coach of the Year says it’s a long shot, but there’s a reason why they play the games.
“We’ll give it the old college try,” added Vikings forward Kylie Moyer.
The second-year behavioural science student from Picton says playing at home certainly doesn’t hurt.
“We plan to work hard at both ends of the court,” said Moyer.
“We have to work as a team and concentrate on defence. This is our gym, our home and hopefully, with a little bit of luck, we can pull off an upset. We’re not as bad as our record would indicate. We’re capable of playing some pretty good basketball.”
Game time on Thursday is 6 p.m.
Other teams taking part in the three tournaments include Algonquin, St. Clair, Humber, Durham, Sheridan and Niagara colleges.
The gold-medal final is scheduled for Saturday at 5 p.m.
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