Saints and Chargers battle it out with area teams during local weekend tournament

Basketball teams from both Hilltop and École St. Joseph High Schools took part in a weekend tournament with games spread out between both schools. The Strike Invitational Junior Basketball Tournament featured visiting teams from Fox Creek, Onoway, Mayerthorpe, Edson, and Westlock. Athabasca was also supposed to take part but had to back out. Due to having lost a team on each side of the tournament (boys and girls), the St. Joseph Jr. Boys ended up with a bye into the finals following their afternoon win against Onoway.

Once the action was completed on the Jr. Boys side, the Saints had silver medals around their necks following a tough loss to Onoway, and the Chargers had bronze. The Jr. Girls wrapped up in similar fashion with the Chargers taking home matching bronze medals and the Saints Girls lost in a consolation final by a slim four-point margin.

Saints Jr. Girls A team coach Janelle Garnier was in the stands during the Jr. Boys Saints match up against Onoway and said that the teams played well. “They are a fast team. They have some tall boys that can rebound which is good. I thought they did well.” Her team played against the B team that morning (January 11) and gained experience. “Our Girls Jr. B team took the place of the Athabasca girls’ team that couldn’t attend. The girls weren’t supposed to play in this tournament but ended up getting the chance to.”

St. Joseph’s has a B team this year due to overwhelming interest in the basketball program at the school. “We had 33 girls try out for junior girls basketball this year so the coaches, the athletic director, and Mr. Hein thought they would try and run a second team since so many girls wanted to play. It’s awesome to see the level of excitement for basketball,” said Garnier. The Jr. teams are made up of students in Grades 7 to 9 and they play several tournaments both home and away throughout the year.

Aside from being fun and full of great basketball action, the weekend tournament has also become a great fundraising opportunity for the Whitecourt Food Bank. All teams are encouraged to take part in a toilet paper race to see which team can collect the most bundles of toilet paper. “Our teams are always fighting to bring in the most. There are a lot of toilet paper bundles out in the lobby. Mr. Hein has done a count and he said there are almost 700,000 paper piles. His hope is to do one million paper piles by next year. It’s awesome and nice to give back.” Also, in basketball action from the weekend, the Hilltop Sr. Boys team won gold in an Edson tournament.