CDDHS Royals senior team wins District 4 championship

Written By Brian Lockhart

The Centre Dufferin District High School Royals boy's basketball team has captured the District 4 championship with a win over the Norwell District Secondary School Varsity Reds at home on Wednesday, Feb. 14.

The Royals came to the final game as a first-place team, undefeated for the season.

They dispatched the Emmanuel Christian High School Eagles 73-12 in their semi-final game on Feb. 12 to earn the right to advance to the final.

Norwell finished the regular season in second place with a 4-2 record.

The Royals took an early lead and stayed ahead for the game. At the half, CDDHS was leading 34-18.

By the end of the third quarter, they had stretched the lead to 28 points going ahead 55-27.

The Royal claimed the championship with a 71-39 final score.

“At the start of the year, we weren't getting it together, but our practices were getting better, and we were more focused,” summed up Royals forward Hayden Stephens of the season. “I felt pretty confident coming into today's game, and I'm pretty sure my teammates were also confident.”

Teammate, Mohammad Raza, also thought the team improved as the season went on.

“It's been good. We started the season kind of shaky, we were still getting to know each other.” Mohammad said. “We started practicing, stayed in focus, and we started getting results. Our team worked together – that's all part of basketball.”

The Royals will now move on to compete at the regional level at CWOSSA where they will be up against other championship teams.

Centre Dufferin is hosting CWOSSA this year, with games being held at CDDHS as well as at Westside Secondary School in Orangeville on February 23-24.

The Convenor for the event is CDDHS coach Matt Barlow.

The winning team from CWOSSA will go on to compete at the provincial level at OFSSA.