It wasn’t the weekend, the Cochrane High School Cobras senior boy’s basketball team was hoping for, but they’ll have to live with it.
Cochrane High played host to the 3A South Central Zone Varsity Boys Basketball Tournament over the weekend on Mar. 9-12, and the home team was looking to impress.
The team got off to the perfect start against Holy Trinity Academy from Okotoks on the opening day of the tournament, smashing them 82-54, before continuing that momentum on Mar. 10, with a 62-50 victory over local rivals Springbank High School Phoenix.
However, the dream stalled on Mar. 11 when Cobras (the fifth-seeded team in the province) went up against Chestermere Lakers (second-seeded provincially).
Despite a back and forth game, and being down 14 points at one stage, Cobras battled back in the final quarter and were within two points in the last minute of the game, before Lakers pulled away with the 75-70 win.
“We were hoping we would win,” said Cobras head coach Jim Forrest.
“It was always going to be a big challenge. We played them twice before in the season, and they beat us pretty badly the first time (94-58), but we were missing a couple starters. The second time was in the divisional playoffs and we lost by 15 points. So, we were getting closer, but we knew we’d have to play the best game of our season if we wanted to progress.”
Cobras next went to the silver/bronze medal game against George McDougall Mustangs on Mar. 12 to see who else would join Lakers at provincials.
The home side fell to defeat for the second game in a row, 73-66, leaving a sour taste in the mouth of the Cobras, despite an otherwise excellent season.
“Getting into foul trouble early on was our Achilles heel,” Forrest admitted.
“We’re not the deepest team, so once we got behind we couldn’t catch up.”
Despite losing in their own gym, Forrest believes the team can hold their heads high.
“We knew we’d have a good team this season,” he said. “We lost some kids we thought we were going to have from last year, so the team was short in numbers but had a really good core group.
“Our goal was to make it to provincials, but we came up short. Still, that was a lofty goal, and we had a pretty good season, where we were ranked among the top five-ten teams in the province throughout the year.
“We’re proud of the guys.”
