After a one-year absence, the Yale Lions senior boys basketball team is going back to the Big Dance.
The Lions punched their ticket to the B.C. AAA high school championships on Saturday afternoon, out-lasting the North Delta Huskies 60-53 in the Fraser Valley's seventh-eighth placing game at the Langley Events Centre.
The game was a do-or-die proposition – the victorious Lions claimed the region's last provincial berth, while the Huskies saw their season come to an end.
Al Friesen's Yale program has been a perennial presence at provincials over the last decade, and the Lions won it all in 2008 and 2010. But this year's team doesn't boast the size or experience the Lions had in their heyday, and a B.C. berth was anything but a given.
But the Yaleans got the job done on Saturday, fusing a red-hot shooting performance from Grade 11 swingman J.J. Pankratz with gritty team defence.
"I'm very happy for these boys," Lions coach Al Friesen said afterward. "For the Grade 12s, it's just great. It's a group that has tried to find an identity. They always felt they should be like the Yale teams that have been before.
"But we weren't as big, and we didn't have all the size and athleticism that some previous teams had. They struggled with it – how could they keep that tradition at Yale where we generally go to provincials?"
The Lions got off to a slow start on Saturday, as the Huskies opened an early 7-0 lead. But Pankratz found his range at that point, knocking down a series of three-pointers as his team took a 25-24 advantage into halftime.
Pankratz opened the third quarter on fire, swishing treys on back-to-back possessions. His hot shooting was contagious, as Jacquin Bennett-Boire and Trevor Berge followed up with shots from beyond the arc as Yale opened an 11-point lead midway through the frame.
North Delta battled back and drew to within 55-53 with 4:20 left in the fourth quarter. But the Lions shut them out from that point, and pulled away in the final minute.
"I've said we will never win a big game until it's the defensive end where we dig in when things go bad," Friesen said. "Today, we did."
Pankratz counted six treys among his game-high 24 points, and he added seven rebounds and three blocks. Bennett-Boire also had a big game with 15 points, 10 rebounds, seven assists and four steals, while Berge (13 points) and Abraham Falls (15 rebounds) also chipped in for the Lions.
HAWKS FINISH FIFTH
The AAA provincials run March 13-17 at the Langley Events Centre, and the Lions will be joined by the W.J. Mouat Hawks, who finished fifth in the Valley after beating White Rock Christian Academy 83-74 on Saturday.
The Hawks had secured their B.C. berth on Friday, when they beat North Delta 79-52. Saturday's win merely improves their seeding. Mackenzie Thompson led Mouat with 25 points.