ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — Jared Nickens and Jarryn Skeete played their best games of the year. Their big men were carrying the ball up the floor. The hobbled St. John’s Edge were doing whatever it takes to nail down a spot in the National Basketball League of Canada’s championship series.
“It’s challenging right now,” acknowledged Edge coach Steve Marcus, “but we’re getting different guys stepping up at different times for us, and it’s working.
“Jared Nickens came in last night and started knocking down threes. Jarryn Skeete played the best game he’s ever had in an Edge jersey.”
The shorthanded Edge are one win away from advancing to the NBL Canada’s final following a 107-92 win over the KW Titans Tuesday night at the Kitchener Auditorium. St. John’s can wrap up the series and punch a ticket to the league final Friday night on the Mile One Centre hardcourt.
The Edge played the game without one of their top performers this season — and last year, too — in Dez Lee, who’s been battling a leg injury throughout the entire playoffs. And Olu Ashaolu had a taped-up thumb after dislocating it Sunday in Game 4.
St. John’s, of course, is already without star guard Junior Cadougan and forward Shaquille Keith for the remaining of the season after those two suffered injuries in the first-round playoff series against the Sudbury Five.
“When Skeete came off,” Marcus said of his go-to guard Tuesday night, “we had no ball handler to come in and get the ball over half-court.
“So it was done by committee. Murphy (Burnatowski) brought the ball up, Glen brought the ball up, Olu brought the ball up. We kept the ball out of Carl’s hands to give his legs a break.
“We run offensive sets in practice with our bigs bringing the ball up the court.”
Even Carl English, who missed two months of the season following thumb surgery, isn’t 100 per cent. The veteran guard from Patrick’s Cove, last year’s NBL Canada MVP, has had his leg/ankle issues all year long.
“It’s a testament to our team the way everyone has been stepping up,” Marcus said.
The Edge played with nine players, including Satnam Singh, who played a total of 11 minutes in the playoffs prior to Tuesday’s game.
Singh saw a couple of minutes of floor time in Game 4.
The Edge had a partial fix to their injury woes prior to the start of the Central Division final with the signing of Kyle Johnson, a two-time NBL Canada champion with the London Lightning.
Johnson was in the lineup for Games 1 and 2 against the Titans, until the league announced prior to Game 3 a player exemption granted to the Edge has been rescinded, removing Johnson from the active playoff roster.
Under the league’s “special hardship rule”, it states: “In the event that a Club with two players on its Injured Reserve has an additional player who sustains an injury, that Club may substitute a player in his stead” after meeting conditions.
At the time when Cadougan was injured, the Edge had lost Keith and it was still unclear if English could play.
The team maintains that on April 17, prior to the start of the Edge-Titans second-round series, the league granted an emergency player exemption to St. John’s based on the fact the team had multiple players who were questionable to play, leaving it at risk of having less than the required eight players to put a team on the court.
“There’s a certain us-against-the-world mentality now." — Steve Marcus
The request was supported and the emergency exemption was granted, the Edge maintain.
“That’s the thing,” Marcus said. “We were granted an exemption, and the it’s like, ‘Never mind.’”
After taking a 2-0 series lead on the Titans at Mile One, St. John’s travelled to Kitchener and promptly lost a pair of games before stemming the tide with Tuesday’s victory.
“There’s a certain us-against-the-world mentality now,” Marcus said. “We were worried about the injury situation, the refs, what the league is doing to us, but Glen, showing veteran leadership, said, ‘Fellas, we’ve got to lock in here. Forget about everything else.’
“And I thought we played the most compete 48 minutes of the season Tuesday night.”
Skeete and Davis both scored 21 points for the Edge. Nickens netted 17, Kitchener-area native Burnatowski scored 12 and Isaiah Tate added 11 points.
Friday’s tip-off is 7 p.m.
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