The Paul Kane Blues are one win away from going to the 4A provincial men’s basketball tournament.
A victory tonight against the Bev Facey Falcons in the metro Edmonton premier final would secure a spot in the 16-team draw, March 17 to 19 at Ross Sheppard High School. Tipoff is 7 p.m. at O’Leary High School.
Win or lose, the Blues will still compete in the zone playdowns next week. Four teams, including the metro and public league champions, will represent the Edmonton zone at provincials.
The 10th-ranked 4A team in Alberta is 27-9 overall after sinking the Archbishop Jordan Scots 78-70 in Wednesday’s semifinal at Paul Kane. Connor Bradley and Khalil Bertin tossed in 18 points apiece and Stuart Boucher added 11.
In league play the Blues defeated Facey 82-74.
The Blues (11-1) finished first in pool A. Facey (7-4) was the top team in pool B.
For the fifth year in a row, the Paul Kane Blues will hoop it up in the metro Edmonton junior men’s final.
Tipoff is 3 p.m. today against the Bev Facey Falcons at O’Leary High School.
Facey (11-1) finished first and the Blues (10-2) placed second in premier. Facey beat the Blues 63-46 Jan. 4 at Paul Kane and 61-59 at Sherwood Park in the last game before the playoffs.
In Tuesday’s semifinal the Blues knocked off the third-place O’Leary Spartans 64-60.
The Blues are shooting for their first premier junior title since 2003. In their last four finals, the Blues lost to O’Leary in 2007 and 2008 and the Christ The King Chargers in 2009. Last year they fell 63-52 to O’Leary.
St. Albert figure skaters Cole VanDerVelden and Chris Mostert returned home from the Canada Winter Games with medals.
In pre-novice pairs, VanDerVelden, 17, and Kendra Digness, 12, of Stony Plain collected 75.96 points for silver. They were second in both the short program (27.41) and free skate (48.55). The winning Ontario entry had 86.69 points.
VanDerVelden and Digness train at the Ice Palace Figure Skating Club.
Mostert, 15, and Christina Penkow, 14, of Edmonton were bronze medallists in pre-novice dance with 60.22 points. The Ice Palace duo placed third in pattern dance foxtrot (12.27), fourth in pattern dance tango (10.95) and third in free dance (37.00). The British Columbia pair won gold with 69.03 points. Ontario skaters earned silver with 65.19 points.
