Wachter ready for his first ACAC Final Four
Ryan Wachter is no stranger to playoff pressure, but when he takes to the floor Friday at Concordia College in Edmonton it will be a completely new experience for the Hunting Hills grad.
“Going to the provincials last year (with the Hunting Hills Lightning) helped me as I had to shoulder a lot of the load for the team and it helped being in a pressure situation, but high school is a completely different situation than college . . . it’s not even close,” said the 18-year-old from Red Deer.
Wachter, a six-foot-one guard, is in his first season with the RDC Kings and won’t see a lot of playing time in the Alberta Colleges Men’s Basketball League Final Four.
But he did get some floor time in the Kings 2-0 sweep of the MacEwan Griffins in the best-of-three quarter-finals.
“I got a couple of minutes and that was good experience so that next year won’t be a big shock,” he said.
There was a time this season when Wachter didn’t expect to see any playing time. He was slated to red shirt.
“That was the plan and that was OK,” he said. “I expected to practice and work on things so I’d be prepared for next season.”
By the end of the preseason Wachter was told he’d travel with the team and by Christmas he was playing.
“I got in when we went to Briercrest just prior to Christmas, then after Christmas I began to get a few more minutes,” he explained.
Wachter looks back and understands why head coach Craig Behan began to trust him on the floor.
“I was better defensively,” he said. “At the beginning of the year I was really bad. Also I started being smarter with the ball in regards to turnovers and I just worked hard.”
In high school Wachter was considered a scorer and didn’t play defence with the same intensity needed to compete at the elite level in college.
“This is tough,” he said. “Every day, everyone comes to compete, but it’s fun. In school they needed me to score while here I need to take care of the ball, keep my defensive numbers down and score if possible, But the main thing is to look for the other shooters.”
And the Kings do have several of those, led by Billy McNutt, Randy Davis and Adam Shaw.
The Kings will need their top players to be on top of their game this weekend. They open the Final Four Friday at 8 p.m. against the host Concordia College Thunder while the other semifinal sees the Mount Royal Cougars clashing with the Lethbridge Kodiaks.
“This is the exciting time of the season,” said Wachter. “All four teams are so close we have to be at our best. But our goal from the beginning of the season was to win the league and go to the nationals.”
Nationals are in Prince George, March 20-22. The bronze medal game goes Saturday at 6 p.m. with the final at 8 p.m.
• The women’s Final Four goes in Lethbridge with the country’s No. 1 ranked Lethbridge Kodiaks facing Concordia College and The King’s University College meeting the MacEwan Griffins.
• The ACAC volleyball champion RDC Queens were named the Booster Juice RDC female athletes of the week while curler Dustin Vikse took the top male award.
Vikse was second on the mixed curling team, which placed third at the ACAC finals. He was named the ACAC mixed all-star team.
• Volleyball Queens right side hitter Jessica Clutton played a major role in the Queens run to the gold and was named one of two ACAC female athletes of the week for her performance.
Clutton finished the weekend with 40 kills, 35 digs and five stuff blocks in three matches. She had 22 kills in a five-set win over Grande Prairie in the semifinal.
Contact Danny Rode at drode@reddeeradvocate.com
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