This weekend will be the final opportunity of 2017 for hoop fans to see the University of Victoria Vikes in action as a quirky schedule has both the men and women home at CARSA gym for just the second time this Canada West season.
The Saskatchewan Huskies come calling tonight and Saturday (6 and 8 p.m. tonight and 5 and 7 p.m. Saturday) before the Vikes enjoy a bye week and then travel to Edmonton to face the Alberta Golden Bears and Pandas prior to the holiday break.
Coach Craig Beaucamp’s men’s team is 3-3 courtesy of the Vikes’ first weekend series sweep at Trinity Western last weekend. Dani Sinclair’s women’s squad is 4-2 after dropping their first two results in Langley.
“We’ll have a whole slew of them in the second half,” Sinclair said of home dates. “We looked at it early and going back to the Brandon weekend, and going right through to Christmas, there are some pretty key games in there.
“Obviously, Trinity is a veteran team and pretty tough this year. Then with Saskatchewan and Alberta coming up next, it’s a pretty heavy part of the schedule.”
At Christmas the women will be heading to Toronto for tournament play, while the men will head to the University of Laval in Quebec City.
Having started out 4-0 was important for Sinclair’s crew, which will face a tough test in Saskatchewan, which has won three of the last four Canada West titles.
“In some ways Saskatchewan is young, but in another way they’re not. They kind of surprised a lot of people last year, with the turnover they had, to win Canada West again. It’ll be a good test for us for sure to see where we are at,” said Sinclair.
“It was as if we stole a couple, almost, in Brandon,” she said of getting away with allowing 87 and 80 points, respectively, but still coming away with two key wins. “It was an important start, obviously not perfect, but it was important getting those first four wins, knowing what we had the next few weeks.
“We’re going to learn some hard lessons and we did last weekend against Trinity. They’re a veteran team that plays really hard and they made us pay for our mistakes. We’re not on that level, right now, where we’re competing for 40 minutes and you can’t do that against good teams.”
Of which the 4-0 Huskies (who are ranked No. 8 in the nation) are.
The Vikes’ men’s team has gone the opposite way, with a sluggish start before sweeping Trinity Western and now tackles the 2-2 Huskies, who have already enjoyed their bye week.
“I think both teams are similar, playing undersized,” Beaucamp said of facing Saskatchewan. “They had a big weekend last weekend as well against Thompson Rivers and it should be an exciting weekend here.
“It’s kind of funny how it works out. The first half of the season is only five weekends and if you’re away for three of them you’re only home for a couple,” he added of finally returning home after earning just a split at CARSA to open the season against UBC-Okanagan.
Last weekend, the Vikes used 22- and 21-point performances, respectively, from St. Michaels University School grad Jason Scully to sweep the Spartans.
“Our young guys like Jason and Taylor Montgomery-Stinson have both come into their own this year,” said Beaucamp. “Scully is only in his second year, as far as eligibility goes. It’s taken him a while, to be honest, but he’s toiled his way and stuck with it.”
Scully was a star player for SMUS and then red-shirted his first year at UVic.
As a team, Beaucamp wants to see some consistency on both sides of the court. One area where we wants to see improvement is with rebounding.
“Last weekend we did that and that goes a long way to your success in our league,” he said.
