St. Joan of Arc's return to the local senior girls' circuit can officially be called a success.
The Knights brought down St. Peter's 74-49 to cap off an undefeated CSASC season with the league crown on Wednesday.
It's the team's first CSASC title since 2022, coming back to reclaim the title after the senior girls' program spent the 2024 and 2025 seasons on hiatus.
Head coach Katerina Rosar says the team was brought back mostly to give starters Victory Jesuorobo and Abigail Oster an opportunity to play for the school before graduation.
The pair stood out, especially Jesuorobo, who had a team-high 24 points and racked up a game-high 19 rebounds. Oster added 11 points, five rebounds, and a pair of assists.
"I've got to get a lot out of her," Rosar told Barrie360 postgame about Jesuorobo. "She is a fabulous athlete, but she needs to learn to be a little bit more aggressive because she can be so great."
Shots fell consistently in the first quarter for both teams with St. Joan of Arc's Ellery Ford draining a pair of threes and Madison Borges scoring seven of her 15 points in the frame to get the Knights out to a 10 point lead after eight minutes.
However, the biggest separation came in the second quarter, with St. Joan of Arc outscoring St. Peter's 25-7 in the frame to take a 47-22 lead at the half. During the period, the Panthers went just 3-for-18 shooting.
St. Peter's, which had struggled with lineup consistency throughout what was a 2-4 regular season after multiple players quit, got points from just three of its eight uniformed players.
Mya Bain had a game-high 25 points along with nine rebounds, Madison Salviato scored 18 points, while Tayah Hearns had the remaining six.
The second half played out much like the first half for St. Peter's. A strong third quarter in which the team outscored its opponent by six left hope for the fourth quarter, but the offence struggled to find shooting lanes and again made just three field goals in the final frame.
The Panthers shot 20-for-61 from the field for the day, with Bain making all five of the team's threes on a collective 19 attempts from deep. Meanwhile, the Knights went 32-for-79, draining five of their 14 attempts from beyond the arc.
"I wanted to run the ball, I wanted my girls to shoot," Rosar said. "I wanted them to play a high pace game and I just wanted them to work hard.
The Knights will move on to play Maple Ridge, the defending provincial champions in Wednesday's GBSSA championship game. Both teams are yet to lose a game in league play this season.
Rosar understands that, for her squad, beating the highly-touted Ravens team will be a tall order.
"We have to play a perfect game," she said. "We have to play a strong game to even compete with them."
