It was in question for much of the first half of the game, but the Central Cyclones were able to pull away from the Peacock Toilers to win the city final 78-63 last night at Saskatchewan Polytechnic.

Central coach Ryan Boughen's team was down in the second quarter and the game was tied early of the third.

“I kind of felt like… we were trying to hang onto something we haven’t achieved yet,” Boughen said, talking about the first half. “We were playing more like we were worried about losing instead of going out and playing our best basketball and it’ll be what it’ll be.”

With some good shooting in the third quarter, they turned it around. The Cyclones went on a 16-3 run in the third quarter.

Cyclones Forward Ewan Johnson led his team with 21 points, to help the team win their fifth title in a row.

“We started playing out own game,” he said. “In the first half, were playing slow and scared to get fouled. But in the second half, we picked it up and played our own game and just played hard.”

Boughen said the Cyclones had some fortune to go on some runs at the right time.

“This is a tough place to play,” Boughen said. “It’s loud, you can’t talk to each other. We were a little anxious and we weren’t really ourselves. And they played well. That’s what happens, right?”

This was the fifth year in a row Central has won the boys title, and ninth time in the last ten years.

“It’s a pretty good accomplishment for our school program,” Johnson said of this year’s title. “Even though we lost seven Grade 12s last year we still came back and won it again this year.”

The team did so with provincial team member Dylan Boughen being injured and not playing in the playoffs.

Peacock, meanwhile, was hit by the foul bug in the third quarter and played without star Devin Baumann for a few minutes during Central’s run.

“Central’s a good team, a strong team, but we showed that we can play with them,” said Toilers coach Troy Setter. “We wanted to win and we expected to win, but there was a stretch there. And when Devin gets in foul trouble, that’s hard on us. He’s a big part of our team and our game and everybody knows that. So when he has to sit for eight minutes, they had a run and we couldn’t close that gap.”

Johnson’s 21 led the Cyclones, while Jake McLean hit 17 and Mohamed Jabeteh had 16.

Peacock was led by Baumann with 16 and Tata Mugisha with 13.