LANGLEY —The Lord Tweedsmuir Panthers, who finished third in the Fraser Valley zone qualifier, and the Kelowna Owls, who never came in any higher than No. 9 in any of the 12 editions of the weekly provincial rankings, will meet in the Quad A boys basketball final Saturday night at the Langley Events Centre.The Panthers, the No. 9 seeded team at the B.C. tournament, outlasted the No. 5 Burnaby South Rebels 75-64 in Friday’s semifinals, ending the Rebels’ bid at repeating as champions.
“We believe that we can play with anyone in the province. We believe that we can beat anyone in the province. The Panthers were the No. 1 ranked team in the province at the time. Lord Tweedsmuir, of Surrey, held that top spot in whole or shared it for three of the 12 weeks that the poll was completed.
Against Burnaby South, they held a 49-31 edge in rebounding and had just four turnovers on the game, compared to 13 for the Rebels. Burnaby South, who were trying to become the first team since 2001-02 Kitsilano to win back-to-back B.C. crowns at the top tier, were missing 6-foot-10 forward Sasha Vujisic, a first all-star at last year’s tournament who injured his leg in the late stages of a 81-60 quarterfinal win on Thursday over the No. 13 Centennial Centaurs of Coquitlam.
Vujisic missed seven weeks of the regular season with a broken finger, so Burnaby South had experience playing without him.