River Lions take down BlackJacks to finish regular season with double-digit wins
Matthew Winick
The Niagara River Lions (10-4) defeated the Ottawa BlackJacks (4-10) to close out their 2021 CEBL regular season on Sunday afternoon at the Meridian Centre in St. Catharines.
With the victory, the River Lions become only the second team in the league this season to finish with double digits in the win column, joining the defending champion and first place Edmonton Stingers (13-1).
Down to only nine active players, Niagara used a balanced scoring attack to bring home the win. Seven River Lions contributed at least nine points to the box score, while every player that checked into the game finished with a positive plus/minus differential. It’s clear that despite lots of talent leaving Niagara’s roster in the past few weeks, the remaining River Lions have come together nicely to close out the 2021 regular season campaign.
“They really like each each other, and they’ve bought into what we’re trying to do, and they’ve been here for the entire summer,” said River Lions’ head coach Vic Raso after the game, “We’ve had no issues with the guys not liking each other, whatever goes, goes.”
Leading the way in scoring for the River Lions was Guillaume Payen-Boucard, finishing with 16 points on 7-12 shooting. Forward Thomas Scrubb was also superb for Niagara, stuffing the stat sheet for a near triple-double with 15 points, 11 rebounds, nine assists and five steals.
“I just tried to rebound hard. I didn’t have the best shooting game, I made a lot of tough plays on offense,” said Scrubb, “So I just tried to be aggressive on the boards and play in transition, play defense and do whatever I could to help the team win.”
The loss for Ottawa is its fifth in its last six games and moves the team to 0-7 on the road this season. The BlackJacks played strong defense in the first half, holding Niagara to just 40 points, but some lapses in the third and fourth quarters ultimately had them coming up short from pulling off the victory.
“(Our defensive performance) was average, we had some good moments, but other moments where we didn’t finish out plays,” said BlackJacks’ head coach Charles Dubé-Brais, “It is what it is at the end of the day, they got enough points to beat us.”
Tyrell Green and Nick Ward both led the way for the BlackJacks with 16 points on the afternoon. Ward went a hyper-efficient 7-7 from the field in the loss, continuously bullying his way down low for easy baskets. Despite Ward’s efficiency, Ottawa couldn’t get him the ball more frequently to put the import big man on its back.
After Sunday’s result, both Niagara and Ottawa have completed their regular season schedules. Moving forward, each group will look ahead to making their mark in the single-elimination playoffs beginning next week.
The BlackJacks will begin their playoff journey on the road as the sixth seed against the three-seeded Hamilton Honey Badgers on Saturday at 4:00 p.m. ET. With Ottawa yet to pick up a road win this season; its work will be cut out for them against Lindell Wigginton and the Honey Badgers.
The River Lions don’t know their playoff opponent yet, as they’ll take on the highest seed remaining after the quarterfinal round, playing at the Final Four in Edmonton on Friday, August 20th at 7:00 p.m. ET.
All CEBL games will be available for live streaming on the CEBL’s new OTT streaming service CEBL+, cbcsports.ca, the free CBC Gem streaming service, the CBC Sports App for iOS and android devices, and on Twitch.
A league created by Canadians for Canadians, the CEBL has the highest percentage of Canadian players of any professional league in the country, with 75 percent of its current rosters being Canadians. Players bring experience from the NBA, NBA G League, top international leagues, the Canadian National team program, and top NCAA programs as well as U SPORTS. The only First Division Professional League Partner of Canada Basketball, the CEBL season typically runs from May through August. Head to CEBL.ca for more information or follow us on Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook & YouTube