The Kenaston Kodiaks senior girls basketball team was defeated in the gold medal game at Hoopla earlier this month, but they still can say they enjoyed a great season.
“We as a team talk about it a lot that we won’t base our feelings on whether we’ve had a successful year or not on our last game,” said Kodiaks coach Gene Zdunich. “We beat all the top 3A teams and both of the top 2A teams and we know we had a successful year.”
The Kodiaks lost the last game 57-52 to the Middle Lake Avengers March 15 at Winston Knoll Collegiate in Regina. The Middle Lake win avenged their 51-38 loss to Kenaston in the gold medal game at Hoopla one year ago.
Zdunich said between those two gold medal finals the two teams have played against each other five times with the Kodiaks winning three of those games. He said other than one game where the Avengers were short players and Kenaston trounced them by over 20 points, each of the matches were really close.
“The other games were all decided by five or six or seven points, so when they’re that close against a team that is as good as them and (between) two teams that are as competitive as we are it can go either way,” he said. “We knew that too. It wasn’t a complete surprise that if we didn’t play well they would win.”
Kenaston came out slow in the gold medal final and fell behind Middle Lake heading into the half. A third quarter surge pulled the Kodiaks ahead briefly, but a lack of scoring touch sealed their fate as the Avengers once again took the lead and held on for the five-point win.
“We just never finished as good as we can,” said Zdunich. “I don’t think there was any real turning point. They were just a good team and we needed to play a little better. We knew that if we didn’t play our best we were going to be in trouble and we didn’t play our best.”
The young Kodiaks team, which includes one Grade 12, three Grade 11s, three Grade 9s and four Grade 8s, made it to the gold medal game with a 72-60 win over the Kinistino Blues one day earlier at Hoopla. The hard-working club advanced to the provincial championships by beating the Turtleford Titans 90-26 and the Wilkie Broncs 67-43 one week earlier at regional playoffs held in Kenaston, which followed a 85-23 win over the Central Butte Bulldogs March 1 at the conference playoffs in Central Butte.
Zdunich said with so many returning players he expects the Kodiaks to be strong again next season. He said they hopefully will get another shot at the gold medal, but the aim is to just get better at the game and enjoy their time on the court.
“If we improve every week during the season we feel like we’re successful,” he said. “Our number one goal is our girls have got to have fun. We try and make sure they’re smiling.”