Image Credit: TRU WolfPack Athletics/Allen Douglas

By Adam Donnelly

TRU WOLFPACK MEN'S BASKETBALL

WolfPack men’s basketball hopes to end first half of the season on a high note

Nov 29, 2023 | 6:30 PM

KAMLOOPS — After a bye week from conference play, TRU Men’s basketball is preparing for a pair of games against a quality opponent this weekend, as they hope to finish the season strong.

“It’s kind of hard to believe we’re rolling into our last weekend of regular season before the Christmas break, but two big games ahead,” Head Coach Chad Jacobson tells CFJC Today. “It’s never an easy task when you’ve got to go out and play [the University of Victoria] in their own gym.”

The WolfPack and the Vikes have opposite records. TRU has won one and lost five, including a pair of extremely tight games against the Regina Cougars two weekends ago at the TCC. Victoria has five wins and one loss in the six games the Vikes have played. UVic has averaged 20 more points and eight more rebounds per game than TRU so far this season.

“They’ve got size, they’ve got talent, they’re really well coached, and they’ve got experience. They know how to win,” Jacobson says. “Going into a tough environment like Vic, we’ve just got to be focused, we’ve got to be locked in for 40 minutes and hopefully we show up, play our best and give them a run for their money.”

For fifth-year guard Daniel Bost, this trip is one he’s had circled on his calendar since the Canada West schedule came out.

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“I think it’s a really exciting opportunity for all of us to take a game from the University of Victoria,” Bost says. “They’re a really good program, they’re really well-coached, they have really good players, especially in Diego Maffia, so it’s a really good opportunity for us to go there and have a nice end to the first half of our season.”

The team has been solid on the defensive side of the ball, allowing just 73.5 points per game to start the year.

“[Last weekend] we held a team to really low scores,“ Bost says. “One game in the 60s, one game in the 50s. You can’t ask for much more on the defensive end. We have to take that approach with us on the road.”

However, in the fourth quarter, the ‘Pack have been outscored 142-78 by their opponents. If they want to turn their luck around, they’ll need to find a way to put in some late buckets.

“We’re just right now really struggling to close out some games,” Jacobson says. “The positive is that we’re competitive, we are in ball games. Hopefully, we can learn from a lot of those close losses and figure things out in crunch time.”