Ajax and Pickering athletes hoping to lead their teams deep in March Madness tournament
Published March 16, 2022 at 10:11 am
A couple of guards from Pickering and Ajax are hoping to take advantage of whatever minutes they get to help their schools progress in the NCAA basketball championships – better known as March Madness – which gets underway this week.
Perhaps the best chance for an impact may come from Matteus Case, a 6’5” freshman from Pickering, who appeared in three games coming off the bench for the Providence Friars, who are the fourth seed in the Midwest portion of the bracket. Providence opens the knockout tournament Thursday against 13th-seeded South Dakota State in Buffalo.
Case was part of an Ontario champion Pine Ride Secondary squad in 2018 before finishing his high school career at Chaminade Preparatory School in St. Louis. He was also a member of Team Canada’s U16 squad that won a silver medal at the 2017 Americas Championship.
Providence was the Big East regular season champs.
Vermont Catamounts actually have two local players on their squad as the America East champions, seeded 13th in the West, take on the powerful Arkansas Razorbacks in their first game, also Thursday and also in Buffalo.
Only one will see action, however, as Sam Alamutu of Ajax, a 6’5” guard from Ajax who played his high school ball at a prep school in New Brunswick, was red-shirted this season.
Junior Erik Beckett, also from Ajax, will get on the floor, though he has been mostly used off the bench during his career.
Beckett saw action in five games this year and 22 so far in his career at Vermont. The 6’4” guard attended a prep school in New Hampshire before committing to the Catamounts.
