It is a much different team that is on the floor for the Lasalle Lancers this year, looking to follow in the footsteps of the 2015-2016 SDSSAA and NOSSA championship winning senior boys basketball squad.
Based on results to date, they just might be up to that challenge.
The Lancers completed a Sudbury sweep of the 59th Tomahawk Basketball Tournament in North Bay last weekend, downing the Craig Kielburger Secondary School Spartans from Milton 69-49 in the championship final.
After posting a record of 1-2 at the Notre-Dame Welland Tip-Off one week earlier, the Lasalle lads blasted out of the blocks in North Bay, thumping the Northern Secondary School Braves (Sturgeon Falls) 77-27.
The road to the gold medal encounter including victories over the Confederation Chargers (74-59), White Pines Wolverines (78-52) and Fellowes Falcons from Pembroke (68-52), before taking the final convincingly.
"As the weekend went on, we played more and more as a team, and they trusted the systems which allowed everyone to score a lot of points," noted Lasalle head coach Kyle Beers. "It also gave us a great edge defensively. They moved together and anticipated well, leading to us scoring out of our "D", which has always been a staple of our philosophy."
Catching the eye of several Canadian universities, Noah LaPierre claimed tournament MVP honours, leading a crew that returned only five players from last year - Brady Bond, Dylan Terris, Ronin Makela, Kyle Fong.
In addition to the step forward that has been taken by the first year senior trio of Alex Cunningham, Michael Babcock and Nathan Scully, the Lancers have also benefitted from an injection of youth.
Noah Carpino joins the elder team while still in grade nine, with twins Brennan and Liam LaPierre, and Eric Senechal only one year older. "These young guys are playing extremely high level ball early in our season," said Beers.
"It has been hard to tell they are so young. Eric was a tourney all-star this past weekend, and the twins have brought a great deal of speed and scoring to our systems. Their craftiness has overcome any size issue."
The Lancers continue their string of four straight tournament weekends, heading off for the Barrie Shootout (December 9/10th), before competing out in the Valley in the Gator Bowl on December 16/17th.
