R.D. Parker Collegiate’s athletes of the month for April have both played their last basketball games for the Trojans after four years representing their school on the hard court.
Grade 12 student Dale Cook got one more game in after RDPC’s season as one of three players from the boys’ team chosen to compete in the Basketball Manitoba graduating all-stars game in Winnipeg along with Tyler Braun and Erik Sinclair, the latter being unable to attend because he was away in Europe.
“A couple of guys who went to it before have told me that everybody’s relaxed so that’s what I thought about it,” Cook said. “I went into the game relaxed and then saw there were some scouts so I tried to put on a show. I started off pretty slow then started picking it up towards the end of the game, finished pretty strong. We ended up losing that game, though.”
For the Trojans, the end of the season was a bit disappointing, he said.
“We didn’t finish it the way we wanted at the end of it but all around it was pretty good,” Cook said. “It started off a little slow then we started picking it up, then towards the end we kind of fell short of our goal at provincials.”
Cook credits his leadership for getting him the nod as the athlete of the month.
“I didn’t really lead the team during Grade 9 and Grade 10,” said Cook. “I started leading in Grade 11 and in Grade 12 myself and two other guys on the team took a big role in leadership and I feel like my leadership got me this.”
After graduation, Cook hopes he may have a chance to keep playing basketball.
“Brandon University has looked at me to be a red shirt so once I heard that I really wanted to win and show those guys I could play and hopefully next year I can go there,” he said. “I hope I get accepted to Brandon and go there and red shirt for a year.”
The female athlete of the month is Grade 12 student Jamie Verhaeghe and it marks the fourth time she has received the distinction in three different sports – volleyball, soccer and basketball. She said the girls’ season was a big transition from last year.
“We had a lot of new players coming in and it was just a totally different dynamic to our team that we weren’t really used to so we had to relearn how to be a team but once we started working together we really came together and had a really good season,” she said. “We went to provincials. We didn’t really do that well there but we still had fun so that’s all that matters.”
Personally, Verhaeghe felt she played pretty well in her final season of high school basketball.
“I didn’t have the best season of my life but all around it was a great season and I couldn’t be happier with how I ended it up,” she said.
Verhaeghe says her attitude likely earned her recognition as athlete of the month.
“I just like to motivate my teammates a lot and I’m a good positive person on our team,” she says.
Following graduation, Verhaeghe hopes to attend the University of Manitoba and to continue playing sports.
“I’m looking at a couple of sports teams for soccer but nothing too serious,” she says. “I’ll probably just play intramurals at college.”
“Thanks to the phys-ed department for giving us the gym time and the coaches and especially my teammates for pushing me to be better,” said Cook.
“Thank you to our phys-ed department for everything they’ve done and especially to our coaches Courtney McKay, Nicole Robson and Megan Thorne because they put a lot of their own time into it,” said Verhaeghe. “There was a lot of team drama so I’m glad they stuck with us through the whole season.”
