When your high school basketball tournament sells out in advance of the finals and the host school is only allotted 250 tickets, it has to be the BC Catholics Basketball Tournament.

Holy Cross Secondary hosted the 31st annual tournament Jan. 16-19.

The four-day event has been a highlight and tradition for the Holy Cross community since 1988, with Catholic high schools from across B.C. invited to participate each year.

This year, 12 schools took part in tournament:

·         Vancouver College, Vancouver

·         Holy Cross, Surrey

·         St. Thomas More, Vancouver

·         Archbishop Carney, Port Coquitlam

·         St. Thomas Aquinas, North Vancouver

·         Notre Dame, Vancouver

·         Immaculata, Kelowna

·         St. Patrick’s, Vancouver

·         St. John Brebeuf, Abbotsford

·         St. Ann’s Academy, Kamloops

·         St. Andrews, Victoria

·         Little Flower Academy

Each school represented their senior girls and senior boys basketball teams (with the exception of LFA and VC), for a total of 22 teams.

With the tournament growing in popularity each year, Holy Cross was limited to 250 tickets for the final games featuring the St. Thomas Aquinas Fighting Saints against Little Flower Academy Angels, and the Vancouver College Fighting Irish against the home team Holy Cross Crusaders.

With the bleachers packed and last-minute spectators turned away at the door, both games provided an exciting and spirited atmosphere for the athletes and their fans.

The girls of St. Thomas Aquinas Fight Saints battling it out to take first place over Little Flower Academy    (Elijah Bautista photo)

In the end, victory fell into the hands of the girls of St. Thomas Aquinas Fight Saints taking first place over Little Flower Academy and the Holy Cross Crusader boys bringing home another win for the fourth year in a row, beating Vancouver College.

Olivia Poquiz is a Grade 12 student at Holy Cross Regional Secondary.