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The Stingers like to think of themselves as a quick athletic team that can run with the best of them. But during an 81-68 win over the Bishop’s Gaiters last Saturday at Loyola Gym, Concordia discovered it can also win with physical strength.
Concordia’s win came just eight days after losing to Bishop’s by five points, and pulled the Stingers (5-2) within half a game of the first place Gaiters (6-2).
“We needed to make a statement to the rest of the league,” said forward Patrick Perrotte, who led all scorers with 19 points. “We’re still the defending champs and teams can’t think that winning on our court will be easy.”
When Bishop’s won at Loyola Gym two weeks ago, it ended Concordia’s 13-game home winning streak for conference play, leaving the Stingers eager for the rematch.
“We took that loss personally,” said centre Jamal Gallier who collected six points and four rebounds before fouling out in the second half of the rematch. “We knew we had to be more physical and play better defence.”
The Stingers escaped without any major injuries, but the bumps and bruises were aplenty in one of the year’s most physical games. Elbows swung under the basket, big bodies were pushed aside by even bigger ones, and men flung themselves in the air, to fight for loose balls only to be greeted by serious floor burns.
“That was easily the most physical game we’ve played all year,” said Bishop’s centre Jeff Szita, the second-leading scorer in Quebec, and an early candidate for conference player of the year. “They keyed on our inside game, and every time we were under the basket, whether we had the ball or not, they were all over us.”
Szita had been described by Stinger point guard Chris Blackwood as the “Shaq of the Quebec conference,” after he recorded 25 points and nine rebounds in their first meeting this season. But on Saturday, the Stingers forced Bishop’s into playing around the perimeter and limited the Gaiters’ big-man to just five field goals and four rebounds.
“It’s always going to be physical with him in the game,” Perrotte said. “If [opponents] want to play us like that, we’ll play with them. We’re a good mix here. We have the speed to run up and down, but we can also bang with other teams and play that kind of game if needed.”
The Buckley brothers chipped in with a combined 29 points (18 for Dwayne, 11 for Damian). Dwayne played a game-high 34 minutes, while Damian was limited because of foul trouble. The freshman point guard leads the Stingers in scoring for the season, but two quick fouls in the game’s opening minutes left him on the bench for much of the first half.
“It was weird to finish with four fouls. Usually that’s two games combined for me,” the younger Buckley said.
The Stingers have two games this weekend, beginning with a home date against Laval (5-2), Friday night at 6 p.m. The Rouge et Or took the first meeting between these teams in November, an 83-76 Laval win at Ste-Foy.
Saturday night the Stingers visit the 2-4 UQAM Citadins, a team Concordia has never lost against. The Stingers are 9-0 lifetime against UQAM, including a convincing 91-64 home win in this year’s regular season opener.
