The championship game that everyone was anticipating came to fruition on Friday at the Abbotsford Collegiate Snowball Classic.
The Kelowna Owls, B.C.'s top-ranked AAA squad, will take their best shot at derailing the runaway train that is the St. Andrew's Saints in the finale of the 52nd annual high school boys basketball tourney. That game tips off at 8 p.m. Saturday at The Pit, the venerable gym at Abby Collegiate.
Both teams punched their ticket to the title game with dominating semifinal victories on Friday.
In the early semi, the Owls utterly dismantled the W.J. Mouat Hawks of Abbotsford 88-46.
Point guard Mitch Goodwin, who had struggled at times in Kelowna's quarter-final win over the G.W. Graham Grizzlies on Thursday, led the charge. He racked up 35 points, while Buster Truss (11 points) and Braxston Bunce (10) also chipped in offensively for the Owls.
It was a game to forget for Mouat, as none of the Hawks managed to score in double figures. Mack Thompson and Corey Hauck, with nine points apiece, and Cam Friesen, with eight, were the Hawks' high scorers.
In the late game, St. Andrew's – the tournament headliners from Barrington, Rhode Island – won a battle of teams that share the Saints moniker. They blitzed St. George's of Vancouver by a nearly identical score to the Kelowna-Mouat game, 88-48.
St. Andrew's guard Tom Garrick continued his red-hot three-point shooting, counting five triples among his 21 points. Sophomore point guard Henry Bolton was also feeling it from downtown – his 17 points included four treys – while 6'8" centre Cedric Kuakamensah scored 16 points en route to player of the game honours.
Milan Mitrovic (10 points) and Adam Hildebrand (nine points) were the top scorers for St. George's.
• The News will be live-blogging the Snowball final on Saturday at abbynews.com.