Caleb Roberts good as gold again at Canadian basketball championship

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When gold is on the line, it’s Caleb Roberts’s time to shine.

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The Chatham point guard came through in the clutch again for Team Ontario at the Canada Basketball 17U boys’ championship.

He scored 14 points in the fourth quarter for a 93-87 comeback win over B.C. in the gold-medal game Saturday in Toronto.

The national title is the second for Roberts, who was the championship game MVP when Ontario won the 15U title in 2022.

“It feels amazing,” he said. “Winning another gold medal is really cool. It was a very good experience.”

Roberts was second on the team in scoring (11.2 points per game), assists (3.4 per game) and steals (1.2 per game) as Ontario went 5-0.

“I was more like an energy guy,” he said. “I really brought the defence. I guarded their best player a lot.

“As a point guard, I’ve got to push the pace a lot, get my teammates involved. I’ll score when the opportunity is there, but just to get my teammates involved and play really good defence, that was my role.”

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He shared playing time at the point with tournament MVP Jordan Charles.

Roberts came off the bench in all five games, but he played the third-most minutes on the team with an average of 23.6 per game.

In the final, Ontario trailed by 14 points early and was still down by seven until Roberts went on a tear.

“We had a rough start,” he said. “B.C. came out (and) they were making a lot of shots. We were undisciplined on defence. We weren’t really running off shooters. We weren’t really sticking to our game plan, but we climbed back.”

Ontario trailed 77-70 until Roberts sank a three-pointer with just under seven minutes left. He then drew an assist on a two-on-one with Mahliq Giuseppi-Kitson, scored on a driving layup, drained another three and finally made three free throws after being fouled on an attempted trey for an 83-80 lead with five minutes left.

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His 14 points in the quarter matched his teammates’ combined total. Roberts finished with 16 points, second-most on the team.

Ontario had five players back from the 2022 15U national champions.

“The experience really came into play a lot,” Roberts said. “That fourth quarter, we had four guys on that team in U15 (on the court) and then we had Mahliq. Knowing that we’d been here before, (we had) no need to panic. Just stick to the game plan and just play our game. The experience really showed in that game.”

Team Ontario players meshed well right from the start.

“We’ve known each other since we were all in the fourth, fifth, sixth grade,” Roberts said. “The chemistry was always there. We’ve always played against each other with our different club teams, so we all knew each other.

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“We’re all friends . . . , but during training camp and during nationals we really grew even more (close) than before. It just increased the odds of winning.”

Roberts also played this summer with Montreal’s Brookwood Elite. The U17 team went to tournaments on the Adidas 3Stripes Select Basketball circuit in Nebraska, New York and Alabama.

Brookwood alumni include NBAers Khem Birch, Lu Dort and Bennedict Mathurin. Birch and Dort played for Team Canada at the Paris Olympics.

Roberts played this summer on the Windsor Suns as well. He played football, too, for the Chatham-Kent Cougars varsity team.

“I’m chilling now,” he said. “I don’t have anything else to do until school starts.”

Roberts is entering Grade 12 at Ridley College, a private prep school in St. Catharines. He enrolled there last year after two years at Ursuline College Chatham.

His younger brother, CJ, and their friend, Jaxen Baker, also have transferred to Ridley. The trio helped the Ursuline Lancers win silver at the 2023 OFSAA AAA championship.

“It’ll be very fun, very exciting,” Roberts said.

mmalone@postmedia.com

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