Shoveller Tournament… Huge Tilt This Saturday

I sincerely hope that everyone had a wonderful and joyous Holiday season, with lots of rest and time spent with friends and family! I spent Christmas at my daughter's new home in Cape Breton with our family, and had a great time. One of my favorite gifts from my family, a trip to the Final Four in Phoenix, Arizona!

The Shoveller Tournament is a great event, and we are always so pleased here at UPEI to be a part of it. I think it is held at a great time, just after Christmas each year. This tournament allows you an opportunity to play three solid games prior to the beginning of league play in January. For our team this year, we felt it was very important to have these games. After a less than stellar first half, where we lost 20 man games due to injury/illness, and welcoming back two key guys to our team in Lorenzo Parker and Jake Kendrick, we were very happy to be able to play. Our record in this event was 2-1. We lost to CIS #4 ranked Ottawa in our first game. It was a very solid game, with fifteen lead changes and fourteen ties. They pulled away mid fourth quarter to win 102-88. We won our next tilt against AUS foe Acadia, 95-92. It was another solid basketball game, with Tyler Scott draining a three with one second remaining to give us the victory! In our final game, we upended a tough Queen's team 96-86. We feel that we have certainly improved in several areas, and are now ready for AUS regular season play!

We have a huge four point game this Saturday, at 8:00pm, here at home in the Panther Den against the two time reigning AUS champion Dal Tigers. We have a great deal of respect for their entire program. Tigers Coach Rick Plato is certainly one of the best bench bosses in the country, and his team is filled with top level CIS talent and size. We are fully aware that we have dug ourselves a hole, currently sitting at 2-6 in league play overall, and holding down seventh place. We have had several great practices since the first half ended, and we were fairly pleased with our performance in the Shoveller. Our team has a lot of pride, and we are not at all pleased with the position that we currently find ourselves in within our conference. We have talked within our team about putting together a string of solid performances, by taking care of the little things that we can control. I know that my team will bring their best effort and attitude for the second half of our season! I have said this before on this site, but it may never have been more true than it is right now… it sure would be a huge boost to our team if the Panther Den was full to capacity Saturday night, with a loud and proud throng of the PANTHER FAITHFUL!

GO PANTHERS GO!