The South Delta Sun Devils are venturing into uncharted waters as the quest for their first ever appearance at the provincial "AAA" tournament continues on.
The senior boys basketball team stayed in contention at the Fraser Valley Championships with a 66-54 win over the Port Moody Blues on Monday night.
The result sets up a showdown with league rival North Delta Huskies on Thursday afternoon (2: 30 p.m.) at Fleetwood Park secondary school. The winner will be one of just eight teams remaining in the hunt for seven B.C. berths when the tournament concludes this weekend at the Langley Events Centre. It will be the third time in a week the Devils are playing with their season on the line.
"It's exciting just to be in this position," said head coach James Johnston. "We are not playing pretty basketball right now but that's typical in the playoffs. The key is we are finding ways to get it done."
The match-up with the Huskies is an intriguing one given the Sun Devils defeated their northern rivals by 20 points in the regular season, but then blew a 14point halftime lead in a 6856 playoff loss two weeks ago. Noman Saleem led the North Delta charge with five three-pointers in the second half.
"We just need to focus on our game plan and we did that for six of the eight quarters against them," added Johnston. "We need to play the type of defence we are capable of."
"I told the boys at the start of the season it would be our defence that will get us to where we want to be. We have the athletes to do it and if we can keep our opponents around 60 points then I like our chances most nights."
