R.D. Parker Collegiate’s athletes of the month for January had different endings to their season and, for one, the final chapter has yet to be written.
Grade 9 student Emma Deibert is one of several first-year players on the junior varsity girls’ basketball team and her four teammates who were on the squad last year have some unfinished business to take care of.
“We want to win provincials,” she says. “I think we can. The girls who were on the team last year, they made it to provincials and they knew that they could have won it and so this year has been a redo year. We’re really striving to get first.”
The JV girls kept that possibility alive with a dominating performance at the Zone 11 championships in The Pas Feb. 24-25, winning all five of their games by 40 points or more. The team had nine straight wins and three tournament titles leading up to the zone championships.
“We haven’t won a game by less than 10 points,” Deibert says. “We don’t let up. We want to run the score. We want to send a message that just because we’re from the north we’re not going to be overlooked. So far we’ve been doing that really well. We’ve been trying to stay intense even if we’re winning by a lot.”
Achieving their goal of a provincial championship will require strong performances as individuals and a team.
“We’ve got to make sure we’re finishing,” Deibert says. “It’s something we struggle at right now. We’ve got to make sure we’re giving good passes and working as a team, which we do pretty well at. All the girls on the team, we’re pretty equal with our skills and we can all count on each other to make the game-winning shot or to make a good basket.”
The male athlete of the month saw his team’s season fall short of provincials when the junior varsity boys’ basketball team lost in the final at the Zone 11 championship.
Grade 10 student Kyle Tomchuk said he was called on to be team leader in his second year on the squad.
“We only have two players that really have had some in-game experience so it’s more of a leading role I have to take on and I’m enjoying it,” said Tomchuk. “We’ve got a good group of guys and it’s been fun.”
The boys’ season had its ups and downs.
“We had one [tournament] in Brandon we did pretty good at,” he said. “We had one in Flin Flon. It wasn’t our best but we learned from it to get ready for zones.”
Tomchuk, who also plays soccer and volleyball, says basketball is his favourite sport and the one he’s had the most success in.
“I help out the guys if they’re in a panic mode and they don’t really know what they’re doing, I just help them out, calm them down,” he says, describing himself as a court general. “I like to dish it out but sometimes when we’re in a close game I’ve got to do what I’ve got to do, take it to the basket, get the easy points.”
Tomchuk says his leadership is probably what earned him recognition as one of the athletes of the month.
“I’m leading the guys, making myself become a model that they can look up to, learn from,” he says. “I work hard.”
Deibert says she inspires her teammates to play their best.
“I’ve heard that I’m motivational to the girls around me and I try to make the girls succeed when they maybe need to shake off a bad pass or make up for a bad shot on defence,” Deibert says. “I try to work as hard as I can and it pays off.”
