This past Friday night the Quest Women's basketball team had their first exhibition game against Douglas College. After a month of practice and hard training the girls(and coach) were ready to get the season started. We have been battling the injury bug throughout September and for this game we were without Allie Chalke our starting center and second year player Chelsey Forsberg who had awoken with a stiff neck during the week only to be told that she had displaced a vertebrae. So we had seven girls. On this night we started the exciting Hajia Sooria at point, Britt Harteveld our second year scorer at shooting guard, Charlotte Lau at the 3, Naomi Hughes-Hall at the 4 and Nicola Hitchcock started at center. Coming off the bench was Allison Black and Britt Shalagan.
The first quarter saw us get off to an incredible start and we looked like we had been playing together for years with outstanding ball movement and slick scoring. Our offensive philosophy is to run the ball using our fitness developed in co-ordination with our trainer Jen Segger. It paid off with some easy baskets in transition and intense man to man defense. After a great start the Douglas team gathered their composure and found themselves up 16-13 by the end of the first quarter. In the second quarter our offense became undisciplined and we had a difficult time getting back on defense as a result of the effort we put out in the 1st quarter and our lack of bench depth. We were outscored 12-7 in the second and found ourselves down 28-20 after the first half. The third quarter was not any better as we came out sluggish. It proved to be the game breaker as we were outscored 18-8. The girls were working hard but Douglas's high screen and roll and easy lay-ups in transition proved to be our downfall.
After gaining our composure and making a few adjustments we came out and had a very good fourth quarter. The girls worked extremely hard on defense and rebounded the ball well which eventually led to us winnning the fourth quarter 9-7. The final score was Douglas Royals 53 and the Quest Kermodes 37. I was very pleased with our girls performance as we showed signs of brilliance and strong potential. I thought we competed well with Douglas but our 7 girls were no match for their 13. They are deep, well coached and experienced. We will be pretty happy to have a full squad once the injuries heal. We had some great efforts by everyone from top to bottom. Charlotte Lau had great defensive intensity and came up with crafty steals for scores. She had seven points on the evening. Naomi was our top scorer with 12 points, going 2-5 from the 3 point line and rebounded the ball well. Althought Nicola was playing with a broken finger her interior help side defense was outstanding and provided a strong offensive presence inside. Britt Shalagan loosened up after a nervous start and had some great offensive rebounds and three steals. Hajia was our rock at the point. She moved the ball up the floor really well and had a gorgeous reverse lay-up to get the crowd off their feet in the second half. Britt and Allison, our second year players and vets provided needed leadership for our young rookie squad. Britt was the second leading scorer with 11 points. Being the 1st year in the league and 2nd year as an established university everyone is somewhat of a rookie.
Thanks to all those friends, family, faculty, and students who came out to the game to support us. Thanks to Andrew and the home crew for a great job getting the gym set up and running the scorer's bench. This week we are getting ready to for the Capilano Tournament in North Vancouver. Our first game is against Capilano Friday October 10th at 6:15pm. Hope to see you there......coach Hann
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