Men’s basketball loses shooting touch against VIU
By Courtnie Martin, Sports Reporter
On January 24 the men’s basketball team took a trip to the island to take on the Vancouver Island University (VIU) Mariners. In the first quarter, thanks in part to Andrew Baron being unstoppable in the paint, the Royals managed to take an early lead. Although VIU answered, they still could not hold the Royals from a stellar quarter. However, in the second quarter Douglas got cold from the field and VIU began to capitalize—resulting in the Mariners heading into halftime up by eight. While most of the team struggled in the third, Kristian Hildebrandt was on fire; he would finish the game with 18 points—12 of which were from the three-point line. His performance wasn’t enough in the end though, as the final score was 91-73 for VIU.
“We were hitting enough shots to stick with [them] for most of the game, but down the stretch we couldn’t pull out enough stops to give us a chance at the win,” said Ethan McKean.
“I think we did pretty well. If we play like this against Camosun tomorrow [January 25], I will be very happy with that. Andrew is the glue on this team; he can play all the positions, which often gives us a mismatch in the post. With [him] being a guard defended by a post, he could not be stopped tonight,” commented coach Denis Beausoleil.
