The spring semester preseason basketball tournament took place Saturday January 30th and the Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity moved through the competition with relative ease.
This tournament is open to any team, but fraternities use it as a tune up before the Greek League starts on February 9th. The tournament began with each team playing two games in the morning, which served as a way to seed each squad for the tournament, which began in the afternoon.
PIKE’s strategy was to play as a team. A different starting line up for each game of the tournament proved the confidence each player had in one another. The team held two practices before the tournament, where the players practiced many offensive sets and 5 different defensives. They wanted to use this tournament to prepare for the regular season.
PIKE played open league team, “Tenacity Overload” in the first game. Despite a slow start, PIKE was able to take control, eventually winning by double digits. The second game was against BETA. PIKE won this one with defense; final score was PIKE 32- BETA 6. This left PIKE with an undefeated record, giving them the number one seed in the tournament, which was rewarded with a first round bye.
In their semi final game, PIKE found themselves matched up against SAE. Fighting hard, SAE was able to stay within striking distance throughout the game. But PIKE proved to be too much in the end, winning the game by 8 points.
They met Sigma Chi in the final and the first half was a very difficult match for PIKE, but a big three pointer to end it gave them a 20-19 to lead going into the break. PIKE came out hard in the second half and won this tournament as it started, with defense. PIKE held Sigma Chi to just six points in the second half, which led to a 41-25 victory. They received a huge effort from Ralph Mizrahi in the final and the team MVP of the tournament was shooting guard, Greg Beretta.
Captain, Will McBee talked about the upcoming regular season.
“Our goal is to win the championship,” he said. “Anything else would be considered a failure. The Greek League is very tough this year and we have to come with it every night.”
Michael Lazarus may be contacted at mlazarus@themiamihurricane.com.