Discussions

While it may not have come down to the last second as it has so often this season the Brandon Bobcats swept the Regina Cougars at the BU Gymnasium. The Bobcats came out and without a doubt looked like the No. 1 team in Canada on Friday starting the game on a 18-0 run, while shooting 11-13 from the 3 point range. But like they have all season the lead started to fade and Regina crawled all the ways back to be down by only 6 points. But Brandon held on for a convincing win of 10 points. On Saturday night the ‘cats came out with the same intensity with point guard Yul Michel leading the way, but the cougars held tight and only found themselves down single digits thanks in large part of 4 threes by 1st year regina guard Jeffrey Lukomski and the absence of Dany Charlery who got two quick fouls and sat almost the whole 1st half. The second half on Saturday was a different story than on Friday’s. Led by Charlery’s 17 second half points the cats found themselves on their way to a 16 point lead and another week’s stay at the No. 1 ranking in Canada.  
 
Down in the east coast the Acadia Axemen who are being coached by Les Berry who was coaching at BU for 2 years also found themselves having a very good weekend. On Friday they beat the No.6 ranked Cape Breton by 2 points and then on Saturday by beating the No. 7 ranked St. Francis Xavier X-men for the second time in as many weekends are looking for a big jump in the rankings. What I am trying to say is pending both these teams make it to Halifax could there be a possible first round matchup between them and the Brandon Bobcats, pitting Barnaby Craddock against the man he was hired to replace Les Berry and Steve Bauer?  
 
Now not getting to far ahead of ourselves looking to the Great Plains division playoffs the Manitoba Bisons and Regina Cougars have a huge weekend that could decide the 3rd and final sport in the division playoffs, judging that the Winnipeg Wesmen when all outcomes looked at have clinched second place. The Bisons and Cougars split earlier this season with Regina winning by 8 the first game and Manitoba winning a tight 93-92 contest that was won on a Graeme Mitchell pull up jumper. The games will have live stats that you can follow on the Regina Cougars website.  
 
The Bobcats are looking forward to this week’s home and home series against the Winnipeg Wesmen. The Bobcats have two objectives, to keep their No. 1 ranking and to send a message to Winnipeg that they are number one for a reason. It looks like Winnipeg could be the team that comes and plays here in the Great Plains final. Thursday they head into Winnipeg to face theWesmen where they are 1-1 this season. It should be a very tough game especially when they are facing Erafan Nassajpour who always finds a way to ruin things for the Bobcats. They have a return match Saturday night at BU where the Bobcats look to close out the regular season on a winning note and some momentum heading into the playoffs. If the Bobcats shut down Nassajpour they should have an easy victory as all season he has carried the Wesmen to their 10-10 record.  
 
It will be senior night at the gym on Saturday where Brandon native and team captian Chad Jacobsen will be honored, so it would be nice to see the stands filled for what could be the most exciting game of the year.