On Saturday, the fans at SaskTel Centre rose to their feet to say good-bye to Saskatchewan basketball great and Rattlers guard Michael Linklater. The 36-year-old who won a national championship with the local Huskies and had a great career playing in the FIBA 3-on-3 circuit, was honoured for his contribution to the game and his community during the Rattlers' semifinal win against Edmonton. Little did Linklater know that his job in pro basketball wasn't done.
Just 24 hours later, Linklater was inserted into the Rattlers lineup, replacing the injured Maurice Jones for the CEBL Championship game against the Hamilton Honey Badgers. Back for a curtain call, Linklater was the first to hoist the Canadian Elite Basketball League championship trophy as the Rattlers knocked off Hamilton, 94-83 , to claim the league's first title.
“It’s really meaningful and I’m extremely grateful for these guys," said Linklater. "These guys, I can’t say enough about them and how great they are – clutch shots, clutch plays, staying together through the ups and downs throughout the entire season. It’s just been an amazing experience and I’m grateful.”
Saskatchewan team captain, Alex Campbell, was named CEBL Championship Weekend MVP, registering a team-high 20 points to go along with 11 rebounds in the final game. Campbell wasn't the only Rattlers player to record a double-double. Forward Ryan Ejim secured the ultimate revenge, recording 13 points and a game-best 12 rebounds against the team that let him go just one ago. Both Ejim and Campbell are proud Brampton, Ontario men who led a Rattlers team that showcased Canadian talent.
The league rules stipulate that each roster must contain at least 70 per cent Canadian content. Saskatchewan captured the first CEBL crown by having nine of its 10 players hail from the Great White North. Only forward Marlon Johnson, from Chicago, Illinois, dressed for the winning team and didn't call Canada home. The makeup of the roster was not lost on Rattlers head coach and general manager Greg Jockims.
“I think a point to make is this last game we had one import player playing and it’s a three-import league,” explained Jockims after his team surprised him by attending the postgame media conference, dousing their head coach with champagne. “I think that’s credit to the Canadian game in terms of how well our star players are Canadian players.”
The Rattlers were guaranteed a spot in the final four playoffs format as the host team. However, they earned a spot by finishing the regular season with a 11-9 record, good enough for third place. Saskatchewan used strong rebounding to knock off the Stingers in the semifinal on Saturday and owned the boards again in the championship game, outrebounding Hamilton, 62-37, including three players in double figures.
The Honey Badgers led, 23-21, after one quarter of play but could not adjust to the style of basketball that advanced Saskatchewan through the latter stages of the regular season and into the playoffs. Inn addition to owning the boards, the Rattlers won the battle in the paint, outscoring Hamilton, 46-28, while netting 24 second-chance points. While Honey Badgers bench boss, Chantal Vallée, is know as an incredible game tactician, she was unable to get her team to stay strong.
“Kudos to Saskatchewan, they completely outmuscled us and outrebounded us, said Vallée postgame. "We didn’t respond super well to the physicality. We couldn’t make our shots and they played a fantastic game. They just wanted it, went hard physically for it."
Different than their high-scoring, 104-103 , upset over top-ranked Niagara on Saturday, the Honey Badgers could not dictate the pace of play and failed to make open looks. Hamilton shot just 10-for-41 (.214) from beyond the arc, attempting more triples than field goals within the three-point line (17-33). Xavier Rathan-Mayes led all scorers with 24 points, to go along with team highs of 11 rebounds and five assists. Ricky Tarrant Jr. contributed 21 points but the final piece of the “Big Three,” forward Demetrius Denzel-Dyson, struggled to find his mark, scoring just nine points on two-for-10 shooting from the field.
It was a storybook ending for the CEBL inaugural campaign in addition to the face of Indigenous high performance basketball in Canada. Linklater may have laced up his sneakers for the final time, but as he signed autographs and posed for photos with several of the announced crowd of 3,119 at SaskTel Centre, there was a sense he will continue to contribute to the game for his community.
“If you look at the support that the league has had, the fan support here in Saskatoon specifically, I see growth," Linklater concluded. "I see growth for the league. There was a lot of people that were skeptical at first. Anything new, people are skeptical about it. So, I think now that people see that it’s legit, that there’s solid content, there’s players in here that are phenomenal, and I think that it’s just going to grow from here and it’s around to stay.”
STATE OF THE CEBL UNION
After the championship was awarded, CEBL Commissioner and CEO Mike Morreale spoke to the assembled press to discuss the inaugural season and the momentum built off a successful Championship Weekend in Saskatoon.
“We saw a tremendous game today," said Morreale. "You couldn’t have written a better script. I’m just so happy for the players, for the coaches – I’m happy for basketball in Canada. I wave a Canadian flag every single day. That’s what I do, and I’m proud of it, and I’m proud of the imports and the guys that have come in here and have adopted to the way we want to do things.
“I will continue to raise the bar for this product and for this game because I think that it’s important that we do so, that we support basketball at all levels. It will take time. But we will ride this wave, we will enjoy it (Championship Weekend), we will continue to invest in this product and in this league."