OKM Falls to AA #6 Pacific Academy

Okanagan Mission Huskies v. Pacific Academy Breakers

December 10, 2022

The Breakers from Surrey, ranked #6 in AA, take on OKM from, for my taste, the best part of Kelowna. This is OKM’s third visit to No Regrets. OKM has 1,000 kids and they have sent both boys’ and girls’ teams this year.

These two teams look evenly matched: both have 11 players, both have some height and both have fearless guards. Q1: truth be told I arrived with the score tied at 15 at the end of Q1. You will have to use your imagination or your memory.

In Q2 they traded deep threes, the second by Huskies Ryan Dekleva and the score moved to a tie at 20. Then another by his teammate Justin Andruchow. While the scoring pace has slowed the game has not as the teams run the floor like madmen. That said, its always nice to finish. End of Q2: Mission 31, Academy 24. The OKM girls’ team and supporters are out in force to support their boys and are making themselves heard!

Halftime thought: If OKM makes a comeback it will be in part due to their cheering supporters and partly due to a remote bluetooth speaker that makes whatever noise needed, controlled by an app somewhere, to spur the boys on. Pity it can’t score for them. Okay, back to the game.

Q3: the Academics came out hot and closed the gap. Put your gloves on to save your fingernails on this one. Coach Lisa makes a personnel change and puts some height back on the floor. With 4 left in Q3 OKM’s Dekleva scores lefty and their lead is at 4. Pac-Aca closes the deficit to 1 with 3 min to go. The battles under the basket for tight rebounds are intense. Fouls are called, most of which actually happened, and the made free throws put Pacific up by 3 as time winds down in Q3. Mission has stalled. End of Q3: Pacific Academy 46, OKM 39.

Q4: Now its showtime. The pressure is on OKM who will have to take risks. Kinda like pulling the goalie in hockey. Pacific leads by 14 with 5 to go. Leo Liu for the Academy raced down the floor for an And-1 layup taking the body on the hapless defender. Now they slows it down and let OKM take higher risk shots in their courageous effort to come back. But Pacific’s half court trapping zone defence has been the key for them. With 3 to go and down by 19 it is dignity preservation time for OKM. Their supporters have definitely not given up though. Dekleva is now a man possessed as he stole on endline inbound passed and layed it up all in one move. Bench players are now in for OKM. A shot by OKM late in the clock that hit the rim was nevertheless called as a shot clock violation. That immediately turned the OKM girl’s team into 12 referees who succeeded in reversing the call. OKM’s David Mulleny coming off the bench in the late going played like a man possessed as he hit a three and then threw his body at every opportunity to disrupt the Academy. Well done OKM in defeat and congrats to both teams.

Final score: Pacific Academy 62, OKM 48

Player of the game: Nathan Chiang of Pacific Academy