The schedule over the next week is daunting: a game at home against the 15-4 uOttawa Gee-Gees, then a trip to Thunder Bay, Ont. to face the Lakehead Thunderwolves. After that comes the playoffs, a gauntlet of win-or-go-home matchups against some of the best teams in the country.
But on Friday and Saturday, the Carleton Ravens men’s basketball team had it easy. With games against the 3-17 Laurentian Voyageurs and 5-15 Nipissing Lakers, Carleton cruised to two blowout victories in its final tuneup before the chaos of the next week, the playoffs and potentially nationals.
The Ravens won 88-66 against Laurentian on Friday, jumping ahead with a 27-5 first quarter lead. On Saturday, a 17-0 run to start the game resulted in a similar 91-61 victory over Nipissing.
“We took [the Voyageurs] seriously, which is really important this time of year,” head coach Taffe Charles said Friday. “We’ve done some good work in the last couple weeks to put us in this position, so again, we just don’t want to be overlooking them, which is progress.”
Guard Aiden Warnholtz led the way against Laurentian with 18 points and nine assists. It was his fourth consecutive game with 18 points or more after failing to do so in a stretch of eight games between Dec. 2 and Jan. 21.
Warnholtz took a backseat against Nipissing, resting for all of the fourth quarter and allowing younger Ravens like Marjok Okado, Jacob Knight, Emanuel Milon and Reginald Jean Seraphin to play more minutes. Charles praised Warnholtz’s leadership but said he needs to “get more of a mean streak.”
“I told him, nice guys finish last,” Charles said. “He’s just the nicest guy … Sometimes he’s gotta be, not a little more selfish, but demand more out of his teammates … Which is not his nature.”
Gebrael Samaha finished Friday’s game with 15 rebounds and 10 points in 19 minutes. Okado led the Ravens in points on Saturday with a career-high of 22.
The weekend extended Carleton’s winning streak to five in a row, dating back to the Ravens’ brutal weekend in Toronto in mid-January. Charles said the team wasn’t playing with urgency, but it is now.
“As a coach, you try to formulate a sense of urgency—that’s our job. It’s urgent, urgent, urgent,” Charles said. “But at the end of the day, they’re kids. Look at the standings. The sense of urgency is now. There’s no convincing at this point in time and they know where they’re at.”
At this point in the season, every win matters. The three division winners in Ontario University Athletics (OUA) receive a first-round bye, along with the top non-division winner. That prized bye is still up for grabs in the OUA East, where uOttawa, Carleton and Queen’s are neck-and-neck atop the standings.
Home court advantage in the playoffs is also up for grabs. Carleton’s two remaining games—as well as Queen’s and uOttawa’s final games—will determine how difficult a path all three teams have to U Sports nationals next month in Halifax.
The Ravens’ game against uOttawa on Wednesday—a rematch of Capital Hoops earlier this month, when Carleton won 67-61—could be the difference.
“Win at all costs,” Charles said of his team’s approach. “One point’s good enough.”
Featured image by Jayden R. Dill.
