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Capers dominant in hoop win over Huskies

SMU coach: 'That was just a bad day for us'

By MONTY MOSHER Sports Reporter, The Chronicle Herald
The Cape Breton Capers men’s basketball team had to scratch and claw for a win Friday night at Saint Mary’s.

The Huskies were far more accommodating on Saturday.

The CIS No. 4 Capers finished a weekend sweep at The Tower with a 102-75 thrashing of the listless Huskies that left the host team shaken and looking for answers.

"That was just a bad day for us," said SMU head coach Ross Quackenbush. "But full marks to them. I’m not saying we lost the basketball game because we had a bad game. Obviously, there are two teams out there and they played very well."

CBU, 10-1, won its ninth in a row, the only conference loss coming against the Huskies in November. Tenth-ranked SMU is 8-4 with undefeated St. Francis Xavier in Halifax on Wednesday.

"Today I thought our guys did a better job focusing," said Cape Breton head coach Jim Charters. "Last night we played a lot of one-against-five and we were trying to put on a show instead of playing team basketball. When we do that we’re not very good."

Cameron John-Proctor had 24 points and 12 rebounds to lead the Capers on offence. Paris Carter had 23 points, including four three-pointers, and Phillip Nkrumah added 12.

Joey Haywood had 30 points and 11 boards for the Huskies, down 51-30 at the half. Simon Marr had 12 points and Ikeobi Uchegbu 10 points and 12 boards.

Haywood is third in CIS scoring at 22.7 points per game.

Cape Breton trailed by double digits entering the fourth quarter Friday only to rally to win 87-84.

But the Capers raced away on Saturday with Carter hitting a three and step-back jumper late in the first quarter to get the visitors a 25-16 edge.

Nkrumah’s dunk off a turnover had the Capers up by 12 in the early minutes of the second quarter. A 16-6 run after that, with Jimmy Dorsey accounting for six points, put Cape Breton in control 45-23.

Cape Breton led by 30 early in the fourth quarter until some indifferent minutes allowed SMU to crawl back to 82-63 with five minutes left. Charters put his starters back in and a pair of threes from Carter and one each from John-Procter and North Preston’s Tremaine Fraser made for a comfortable landing.

Cape Breton won the battle in the paint 56-24 and outscored SMU 22-2 off turnovers.

Dorsey, a Maryland native in his first year with Cape Breton, thought the CBU bench had a big day.

"We just played harder than we did yesterday," said Dorsey. "We knew we had to play four quarters because two quarters just isn’t enough. They proved that yesterday. That was a big difference-maker playing all four quarters."

Tigers 82, Sea-Hawks 62: At St. John’s, N.L., Dalhousie ended a two-game losing streak to go to 6-5.

Memorial is 1-10.

Joe Schow had 15, Andrew Sullivan 13 and Simon Farine and Chris Hunt 12 each for Dalhousie. Nova Scotia products Robbie Habib and Jason Shepherd had 16 each for MUN.

In women’s play, it was:

Capers 60, Huskies 48: At The Tower, Kelsey Hodgson had 33 points and 10 rebounds as CIS No. 5 Cape Breton made it 13-0 start.

Hodgson, the reigning AUS player of the year, took over the CIS scoring lead at 23.4 points per game. Karmen Brown added a game-high 13 rebounds.

Rookie Justine Colley, just behind Hodgson on the scoring list at 21.6, had 19 points for the Huskies, down 30-25 at the half. SMU is 6-8.

Tigers 73, Sea-Hawks 69: At St. John’s, N.L., April Scott had 19, Laurie Girdwood 18 and Cailin Crosby 14 as Dalhousie stunned 10th-ranked Memorial.

The Tigers, up by as much as 19 in the game, have won four out of five for a 5-7 slate. The Sea-Hawks are 8-3.

Victoria Thistle and Brittany Dalton each had 21 for MUN.

Varsity Reds 65, Panthers 46: At Charlottetown, Amanda Sharpe had 22 for UNB, 6-7.

Victoria Walker had 18 for UPEI, 0-12. The Panthers led by a point in the third quarter before faltering.

( mmosher@herald.ca)