North Shore basketball teams have had enough problems contending with one Swant girl, but now there are two?
On Wednesday night the Argyle Pipers senior girls team claimed the North Shore AAA title with a 53-48 win over Handsworth and it was Argyle star Sophie Swant who led the way with a big assist her from little sis, Georgia.
Sophie, a relentless Grade 12 forward, bulled her way to 26 points, 12 rebounds, four steals and two blocks in the win, while Grade 9 rookie Georgia Swant added nine points and provided cool and calm point guard play that belied her young age.
“Two Swants — that’s not fair,” said Argyle head coach Anthony Fortunaso with a laugh.
Handsworth built an early lead by throwing up a trapping, pressing defence that rattled the Pipers. With the game on the verge of slipping away in the first quarter, Fortunaso brought Georgia off the bench and the momentum started to shift the other way.
“I thought she came up huge for us. She really calmed us down when they were pressing us, she made some really good passes,” said Fortunaso. “People go after her because they know she’s in Grade 9 — she just handles it, she doesn’t let it affect her. I thought she was a real calming influence out there. Her sister is really emotional. She’s kind of the opposite. Calm.”
The Royals, meanwhile, were battling uphill all game because their star guard Alanna Martin — recently picked as the North Shore Player of the Year — got into early foul trouble and had to sit on the bench for long stretches of time. Martin, bound for CIS school Wilfred Laurier next year — ended the game with just five points.
“She’s a great player, she’s one of the best shooters in the province,” said Fortunaso. “She’s really tough to handle because she’s so good at coming off screens and getting open. If you give her a little sliver she’s going to hit it. And she’s such a competitor in the same way that Sophie is — she wants to win so bad. . . . When she got into foul trouble it was really tough for them. But I thought they did a really good job, they had some people step up big.”
Handsworth forward April Christiansen and guard Nicola Ros kept the score close, putting up 11 points each in the game, and when Martin returned to the floor in the fourth quarter the Royals jumped back into the lead. Martin, however, picked up her fifth foul with a little more than two minutes left. At that point the Royals were leading 48-45 but they wouldn’t score again in the contest.
Instead it was Argyle’s Danielle Paulson who provided the decisive buckets, dropping in a layup off a slick inbounds play to pull the Pipers within one at 48-47 before hitting a huge three-pointer on the next possession to put the Pipers in the lead for good. Paulson finished the game with nine rebounds and nine points, five of them coming in that crucial one-minute stretch.
“She had been struggling all game and (we) just kept telling her ‘keep at it, keep shooting those because they’re going to go in,”’ Fortunaso said of Paulson. “She hit that layup and then came right back down the court and hit that big, big three — that was huge. That’s what you get with a Grade 12. They know they’ve got to keep taking those shots.”
Handsworth had a couple of shots to tie it up in the dying seconds but couldn’t knock them down. At the final buzzer the Pipers celebrated their upset victory — Handsworth finished first in North Shore premier league play with a 7-0 record while the young Pipers scuffled into fifth place with a 3-4 record. When the same two teams met in January, the Royals claimed a 66-54 win.
“It’s like I told the kids before the game — it’s playoffs now,” said Fortunaso. “The fact that they beat us before doesn’t really matter. Everybody gets a fresh start. I think they really took that to heart and they didn’t let our last loss hurt us.”
The North Shore final was a tough, physical affair, as was expected.
“That’s a classic North Shore, Handsworth/Argyle rivalry game,” said Fortunaso. “Just getting after each other, really physical. They all know each other really well so it’s really hard to get anything by them.”
Leading the way in the physical department was Sophie, who threw her body all over the court on offence and defence while managing to avoid serious foul trouble. The SFU-bound forward’s shot wasn’t dropping for much of the game but she still did a ton of damage, including a 14/20 performance at the free throw line.
“She was rebounding, she played defence. I thought she really held us together today,” said Fortunaso. “And when we needed a big shot we knew she was going to be there, and when we needed to get to the free throw line we knew she was going to be there. Her game today was fabulous.”
Fortunaso is hoping that his team’s North Shore championship win is a good omen for the rest of the playoffs.
“We’re a little bit under the radar and we can definitely surprise some people.”
Both teams will now turn their attention to the Lower Mainland Championships with Argyle set to host the opening rounds of the tournament. Argyle and Handsworth will both be in action Monday night against undetermined opponents. Argyle will tip off at 6:35 p.m. with Handsworth to follow at 8:15 p.m. If both teams win they will meet again in the Lower Mainland semifinals Thursday starting at 6:35 p.m. at New West secondary. The winner of that game will earn an automatic berth into the provincial championships while the loser will have more work to do on the consolation side.
The provincial championships are scheduled for March 4-7 at the Langley Events Centre. Handsworth was listed at No. 7 and Argyle as an honourable mention in the latest provincial rankings, released before the North Shore final.
