Holy Cross Collegiate had their Invitational Tournament last weekend, and they had a strong start, building from their training and experiences from the start of the season.  Playing some close games leading up to the tournament gave them the confidence to put all their hard work into action.  Head coach for the senior boys team, Joshua Jalbert talks about the level of calmness and control the team exhibited during the first two games, "We won our first two games, I felt that we were in complete control of the game.  I got to play the bench a fair bit, and the boys played really well.  We just had a couple of defensive breakdowns, but we were moving the ball well. We were pushing the pace, we were doing all the things we like to do and we were scoring lots of buckets. Like I said we were in complete control of the game and I felt very confident of how our team performed."   

Their great teamwork and play led them to the finals against their rivals St Joesph Collegiate Crusaders out of Brooks.  The HCC boys worked hard but had some holes in their defense and the other team capitalized.  Jalbert talks about the shortcoming, "The biggest thing was that we were letting them get inside on the dribble. They are a very quick, and fast team, and they have lots of good players. That was kind of what let us down, we had a bit and a little bit more in the second quarter where we fell a little bit behind, and we weren't able to climb out of it."

Fighting through injury was also a hindrance to the home team.  Jalbert talks about the impact injury had on the game, "We also had a key injury to our starting center. Joe Szasz got hurt in the first quarter. He did come back later in the second quarter after we had taped up his shooting hand.   He was only able to use his left hand for the remainder of the game, but he still finished I think six for seven on shooting, so he was actually quite efficient still, but not having him at his full capabilities obviously hurt our team performance."

Jalbert is still happy with the results of the tournament with the final score 86 to 66 for St Joseph.  He feels the more they play St Joseph Collegiate the better they will be prepared when they face them in the Zones tournament.