How’s this for a scoreline: Diego Maffia 96 points, Ross Sheppard High School 88 points?
At the Western Canada Basketball Tournament in Kelowna, B.C., Maffia threw it down like a boss, singlehandedly outscoring Ross Sheppard, as Victoria’s Oak Bay High School cruised to a 114-88 win over their Edmonton opponents on Saturday.
Yes, 96 points. By one player. At an elite tournament.
“I’m so shocked,” Maffia told Global News after the game. “I still really can’t believe what happened.”
“It was something I’ve never seen before, and I’ve been around basketball for, gosh, 35 to 38 years,” said Oak Bay coach Chris Franklin. “It was quite remarkable.”
Franklin said after watching Maffia sink bucket after bucket in the game for seventh and eighth place, his fan instincts started battling his coaching instincts. He started wondering how many points the 6-foot-1 senior point guard had.
“It was always a game within reach for the other team, so you’re partially worried about the final outcome,” said Franklin. “But after a while, you’re kind of curious on what [his point total] is because you don’t really know. You know it’s a big number, but you don’t really know.”
Franklin said Maffia’s teammates started feeding him the ball constantly in the final six or seven minutes, as “they wanted to see a teammate do well when something special is happening.”
Prior to Saturday, the tournament record for most points in a game was 60 by Alex Dewar of Marion Graham Collegiate in Saskatoon. Not anymore. Now it’s 96, a record that will likely never be broken. Notably, seven-foot centre Kelly Olynyk of Kamloops, who now plays with the Miami Heat in the NBA, once held the record at 59 points.
Maffia said “in the third quarter, there was a point where we called a time out and I asked one of my teammates [how many points I had]. I knew the record was 60 and I wanted to have 60. He turned to me and said ‘You have 73.’
“I started laughing because I didn’t know that. And then I started trying to make every shot I could.
“I’m definitely going to frame this scoresheet,” added Maffia. “I’m shocked.”
The game was for seventh and eighth place in the eight-team tournament.
“This is one of the most prestigious tournaments in Western Canada,” said Franklin. “Every team is good.”
Diego Maffia was 30-for-61 from the floor, including 15 three-pointers. At the free-throw line, he was 17-for-19. He also had eight rebounds, two assists, eight steals and a block.
In the first quarter, Maffia scored 27 of Oak Bay’s 29 points. The other two points? Scored by this brother.
Lucas Maffia was Oak Bay’s second-leading scorer with nine points. For Ross Sheppard, Max Petryk led the Thunderbirds with 27 points.
“When I saw (the first-quarter results), I knew we were in for something special,” said tournament co-director Don Walker.
In Oak Bay’s two previous tournament games, Maffia had 47 points in a 97-89 loss to Vincent Massey of Winnipeg on Thursday, and 38 points in a 84-71 loss to Salmon Arm, B.C.
In the final, Vincent Massey will play Burnaby South.
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