The new year began with the Ravens men’s basketball team extending their winning streak to nine games, with road victories over Laurentian and York coming after a bonding trip to Flordia.
“After the season-opening loss [against Windsor], it definitely opened our eyes, and it made us realize that we have to work a lot harder and not be as complacent as we were at the start of the year,” third-year point guard Philip Scrubb said.
In their first game back, Scrubb, Tyson Hinz, and Kewyn Blain each had 14 points to help Carleton beat Laurentian by a score of 81-57 on Jan. 4.
The Ravens then cruised past York 112-62 on the following day, riding Scrubb’s game-high 28 points to victory.
Even though the wins might appear routine based on the scores, some Ravens say the team has a lot to work on.
“I think both games we had pretty slow starts,” Scrubb said. “We need to work on that for the playoffs and then the Final 8, but overall I think we played well in the second halves.”
“We need to work more on our defence. Offense is something that comes naturally to a lot of our players, but things like rotations on defence are stuff we still struggle with and need to practice going forward,” second-year forward Justin Shaver said.
The holiday break gave the team lots of time to practice, as they made their annual trip to Florida over the winter break for a week of intense practices and team bonding.
“We practiced a couple times a day and it’s kind of like a team-building thing where we’re working hard but get to do stuff off the court too,” Scrubb said. “I think it brings the team closer together and we get to stay in shape and work hard over the break.”
Shaver said this year’s trip was more intense for him, even though he already had one experience under his belt.
“I think the main goal for every freshman on the Florida trip is to try hard. Being able to go back, I got to focus more on technical stuff compared to just trying to be the hardest worker,” he said. “Now, I’m expected to know certain things, so it changed my approach a bit to what I had to do.”
How much the practice in Florida helps Carleton will be tested in the coming weeks, as the Ravens can expect to be tested in the second half of the season.
“These are the games we have to win to get a first-round bye in the playoffs,” Scrubb said. “We need to focus on improving every day, and fix the little problems we have so that we’re at our best when we have to win some games.”
In particular, there is a stretch of crucial games coming up where they will face some of their stiffest competition to date, including the undefeated Ryerson University on Jan. 12 and the improved University of Ottawa in the Capital Hoops Classic at Scotiabank Place on Jan. 23.
“We have two tough match-ups coming, and we really haven’t hit the bulk of our season where we have tough competition,” Shaver said. “These next three or four weeks are going to be a huge test to what we’ve done so far and what we can accomplish going forward.”
