The St. Albert Skyhawks prepped for the Paul Kane Invitational as if the tournament was the final exam in high school women’s basketball.
“We’re really excited for the competition. We don’t want easy games. We want to push ourselves,” said Grade 11 standout Teå DeMong on Friday after the team’s third and final two-a-day session in a row of gym time and video. “Obviously, with this training camp we’ve been working really hard to get out of the vacation mode and we’re pushing each other to the hardest we can so we’ll be ready.”
The tournament opener for the 2018 metro Edmonton division one champions and 4A provincial bronze medallists is 7:30 p.m. Friday against the St. Mary’s Saints of Calgary or the Harry Ainlay Titans at the SkyDome.
Seven of the 20 tournament games in the 12-team draw will be played at St. Albert Catholic High School, including Saturday’s consolation final at 12:30 p.m.
A victory would send the Skyhawks into Saturday’s semifinal at 12:30 p.m. at Paul Kane.
The way the championship-side of the bracket is structured, the Skyhawks would face the Bishop Carroll Cardinals of Calgary while the other semifinal at 10:45 a.m. is shaping up to be the Paul Kane Blues against the Jasper Place Rebels, winners of the last two PK tournaments.
Led by U17 national team player Yvonne Ejim, Bishop Carroll knocked off the Skyhawks 64-42 in the third-place game at the District Four Invitational in Calgary in the team’s first tournament of the season.
The third-place game is 5:30 p.m. and the final is 7:30 p.m. as tournament organizers will be shoehorning fans into the cramped confines of the Paul Kane gymnasium.
Last year’s tournament ended with the Skyhawks finishing fourth with an eight-player rotation because of injuries for the three games during a 25-hour span.
The Skyhawks will be good to go this weekend with a healthy lineup of four Grade 12s, three Grade 11s and six Grade 10s.
“We’re very dynamic. Most people can play any position. We have people who can play from the one to the four (position), even the five sometimes. It’s just versatile,” said DeMong, one of six returnees (Bella Cuciz is also back after missing her Grade 11 season because of ACL surgery) from the 29-7 team that lost two players to graduation.
The Skyhawks are 4-0 in league play and 10-5 overall after pummelling the winless Titans 112-27 – yes, that score is correct – Monday at the SkyDome.
Period scores were 30-3, 61-14 and 87-21 as the Skyhawks played only their Grade 10s from midway through the third quarter until the final buzzer against last year’s division two finalists.
DeMong piled up 20 of her game-high 25 points in the first half, while four Grade 10s – Annacy Palmer with 18, Morgan Harris and Maty Drefs with 11 apiece and Dakota Wedman with 10 – also posted double digits.
“It’s a different feel than last year as a team. We were kind of the underdogs last year and now we have something to our names that we kind of have to live up to it so we have to keep getting better and better every day and not suddenly,” said DeMong.
The six-foot uber sharpshooter was recognized as a Metro Athletics all-star in her Skyhawks debut.
“It was definitely a good honour to be a Grade 10 and to see most of the athletes (that were all-stars) were Grade 11 or 12,” said DeMong, who started playing hoops in Grade 8 at Harry Collinge High School in Hinton.
DeMong, 16, rose to prominence during the three most important victories of the season in a 25-day span against the Rebels – 2016 and 2017 division one champions and 2017 4A provincial gold medallists – as the team’s offensive leader came through in the clutch with 19 points in the 68-59 decision at the SkyDome in the last game before the playoffs as the Rebels suffered their first loss in league play; 24 points, including a game-altering 20 in the second half, in the 68-58 division one final at Jasper Place; and 21 points in the 58-56 provincial bronze-medal match at Medicine Hat.
"It was a good season,” DeMong said. “We had a short bench so I was sort of learning to play all sorts of positions and adjusting to less players or teams who can go deeper into their bench and just sort of like how to pace yourself.
“This year on the team I’m like again a two, a shooting guard, but also a bigger guard as well so I can go inside and finish against smaller defences.”
DeMong was also named a second team All-Canadian at the U17 nationals, along with Ejim, as Alberta finished fourth.
“We definitely both took on a leadership role. We worked our butts off to get there and it was just nice recognition to know all your hard work paid off,” said DeMong, who ranked sixth among all players in scoring with 13.6 points per game and fifth in rebounding with 7.8 per game.
“I was playing like the two-three, so shooting guard,” said the U15 second team all-star at the 2017 nationals.
Ejim was the tournament’s top rebounder averaging 8.8 boards and was the second-highest scorer with 14.4 points per game.
Kamryn DeKlerk and Mimi Sigue, a pair of Grade 11 Skyhawks, and Grade 12 Paul Kane hoopsters Kaitlyn Kluttig and Ella Stanley also played for Team Alberta at U17 nationals.
Last month DeMong, Palmer and Harris were among 57 players to receive invites to the women’s national age-group assessment camps in Toronto, which coincided with the 37th annual REB Invitational at Jasper Place as the Skyhawks finished fourth and in the semifinals lost to Paul Kane in a back-and-forth 79-75 double overtime affair.
Palmer and Harris, Grade 10 guards with the U15 provincial team, attended the cadet tryouts while DeMong showcased her skills with the U19 juniors.
“I was three years young for it so there were first-year university girls competing,” DeMong said. “It actually went pretty well. There were 17 of us and they will make cuts for the March camp pretty soon.
“It’s kind of something you train all year for. You hope to get to the camp when you’re identified in the summer with Team Alberta so it definitely meant a lot," DeMong added. “I shot really well and I think that was kind of my role at the camp.”
DeMong also participated in the U17 identification camp in 2017.
“That helped me a lot for this time. You were more comfortable with the area and the girls. You know a few more coaches and you know the atmosphere a little more.”
Tonight the Skyhawks visit the Archbishop Jordan Scots (0-4) at 6:30 p.m.
