The Cedars Christian School Eagles will enter provincials as champions of the north central zone.
The Cedars girls basketball team already had a berth in the B.C. tournament as the host team but was dominant in winning the qualifying event in Burns Lake on the weekend. In Saturday's final, the Eagles beat the Valemount Timberwolves 86-42.
"We had a good, solid effort," said Cedars coach Al MacDonald. "Valemount was a good competitor and stayed with us for the first half. We just basically wore them down and took it away in the second half so the score was not quite indicative of the game."
Janene Giesbrecht had a team-leading 17 points in the final, 15 of them from beyond the three-point arc. Cedars also got 12 points from Kayla Gordon.
In their other games at zones, the Eagles defeated the Tumbler Ridge Kodiaks 80-19 and downed the Fraser Lake Cougars 64-17.
Gordon was chosen as the tournament's most valuable player and Giesbrecht got the nod as a first-team all-star. Kayla Eby of the Eagles joined Giesbrecht on the first all-star team and Shannon Kragt landed on the second team.
The city champion Eagles compete at the single-A level and have now won the zone title four consecutive years.
"We're proud of that," MacDonald said. "We've got the program back at the top after rebuilding, and it's looking good for the next couple years with our good junior program. I think the record is five in a row by Ron Pettigrew [of Dawson Creek] so we're keeping an eye on that."
The Eagles will now turn their attention to the 16-team provincials, March 7-10 at the Northern Sport Centre. They are the No. 2 seed in the province, behind only the Houston Christian Wildcats. Last season, the teams battled it out in the B.C. championship game and the Wildcats won 75-48.
The Wildcats are led by Ruth Hamblin, a six-foot-six Grade 12 post player who has already signed a letter of intent to play NCAA Division 1 basketball with the Oregon State Beavers next season.
Polars prevail at triple-A zones
The PGSS Polars ran to a 3-0 record at their zone championship tournament in Quesnel on the weekend and qualified for provincials in North Vancouver.
Competing at the girls triple-A level, the Polars faced the North Peace Ookapiks of Fort St. John in Saturday's zone final and prevailed 80-46. In the game, Mavia Nijjer drained 18 points for PGSS and Olivia Letendre added 14.
The Polars opened with a 70-25 win against the South Peace Penguins of Dawson Creek and then beat North Peace 76-51. Against the Penguins, Alycia Goudy scored 16 points for PGSS. Nijjer had 20 against North Peace and Emily Aase chipped in with 11.
Provincials are March 7-10 at Capilano University.
In the boys triple-A zones, the host Correlieu Clan downed the Polars in the final. The B.C. championship tournament is March 13-17 in Langley.
