After the women’s Seawolves basketball team lost a close match against the St. Thomas Tommies Wednesday night at UNB Saint John, the seventh place men’s Seawolves looked to defeat their counterpart from up the Saint John river.
Playing in their twelfth game of the season and looking for a second win on the season, the men’s Seawolves basketball team started off strong against the Tommies, who would have five players with points in the double digits by games’ end.
Both sides burst flooding out of the gates from the first whistle, as the Seawolves and Tommies’ offense were eager to get points on the board and aggressively went in for lay ups; both teams quickly fired many shots within the key.
While the Seawolves and Tommies virtually had identical field goal attempts, the Tommies buried three more two point shots and one three point shot in the first half that set the Seawolves in a deficit that only smart playing and a few lucky bounces could see them resurface from.
In fact, both teams had almost identical field goal attempts the entire game, but the word that fits well with attempts, finished, was where the Seawolves were unable to make the net swoosh, i.e., finish, enough times.
Otherwise, the Seawolves would have been in a sea-saw battle in which the odds may have teetered in their favour.
However, in the fourth quarter, Seawolves three-point shooter Ryan Foster was ejected from the game with the score at 71-58 in favour of the Tommies.
With four minutes remaining in the game at the time of the ejection, the Tommies made 4 out of 5 free throws that effectively sank any Seawolves comeback effort.
The star of the night on either side had to be Seawolves rookie, Liam Sipkema.
Playing 31:16, Sipkema netted 19 points and an astounding 16 rebounds (7 offensively and 9 defensively).
On the Tommies side, Calvin LeBlanc registered a team high 21 points and 5 rebounds to lead both teams with a game-high in points.
A final positive note for the Seawolves was their shooting from the line. Boasting a 90% free throw’s made average, the Seawolves were in strong form when shooting for the point. Their strong average is juxtaposed to a meager 56% by the Tommies from the line.
