Men's basketball has to respect their defence
By Michal Tellos
Sports Editor
November 26, 2008
 In a weekend that Head Coach Chris Oliver called “ugly,” the Windsor Lancers men’s basketball team split a pair of games on the road, losing to the Laurentian Voyageurs, but winning against the York Lions.
Against Laurentian, the bar was set early on by the home team, who dominated the Lancers in the first quarter, outscoring them 30-18.
The Lancers stormed back, however, in the second and third quarter, outscoring the Voyageurs 24-28, and 18-7, respectively.
Defensive lapses allowed for a Laurentian comeback in the fourth, where the Lancers were outscored 26-20. A buzzer-beater for the home team finished the game off.
Leading the Lancers in the loss was Monty Hardware who netted 19, while Greg Surmacz and Isaac Kuon also both chipped in with 17. Surmacz also snagged nine rebounds.
Against the York Lions, it was a similar story with a different result, as poor defensive play persisted, but the Lancers managed to hold on to take the game, 99-91.
The Lancers came out scoring early, as they scored 27 points in the first quarter, and held the lead for the rest of the game.
York slowly narrowed the gap throughout the game, as they slightly outscored the Lancers in all of the remaining quarters. It was not enough, though, as the Lancers managed to hold on for the win.
Surmacz had quite an offensive showing in the game, as he scored 33 points and had nine rebounds. Interestingly, the 6’8 forward even made five out of eight three-point shots. Also, Hardware had 18, while Kuon had 17.
Despite the win, Oliver is displeased with the entire weekend in general, partially blaming himself for the collective collapse.
“Complete and utter team collapse. Effort and concentration is an individual responsibility but collectively we were all bad. We are a soft, soft, soft basketball team sometimes and that is completely my fault, and our team veterans’ faults, for allowing that attitude to grow,” he said.
He stressed that he is not blaming the loss and the overall poor consistency on new players, putting the on-court blame on the veterans.
“Our newcomers played okay. The loss, and our poor defence in both games, falls on the shoulders of our veteran players and myself, who have allowed a lack of respect for defence to develop within our team,” he said.
As has been the story so far this season, offence has been doing just fine.
“Defence was the issue. Of course you can always out-score people and win but that is not the foundation of who we are. We need to take every defensive possession personally,” said Oliver.
However, Oliver later downplayed the value of such stats of high scores, saying that they are meaningless when there is no defensive mentality, concentration, or effort.
The boys will next go on the road against the Royal Military College Paladins and the Queen’s Golden Gaels.
In regards to the games, Oliver warns that there will be a much greater level of accountability on defence.
“Every possession of defence will be treated as a desperation situation where if you don’t compete and concentrate, substitutions will be sprinting to the table to replace those who disrespect our team defensive system. No player is exempt. I have done a terrible job holding people accountable for their defensive mistakes and this needs to stop,” he said.
Even though these problems have been widespread throughout the Lancers’ season so far, the system itself will see no changes.
“All we can do is return to 100 per cent defensive focus in practice and hold each other accountable for what has always been the cornerstone of our program – defence,” said Oliver.
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