The inaugural season of the Canadian Elite Basketball League concludes Sunday at SaskTel Centre in Saskatoon with the host Saskatchewan Rattlers (11-9, 1-0) taking on the fourth-seeded Hamilton Honey Badgers (10-10, 1-0). The CEBL Championship Weekend has lived up to the hype and the final game has a myriad of intriguing storylines.

(Tickets available at Ticketmaster. Watch via CEBL TV or the CBC Gem App ).

Revenge
Forwards Shaquille Keith and Ryan Ejim departed the Honey Badgers in late July and were subsequently picked up by the Rattlers. Since joining Saskatchewan, Keith has averaged 15.9 points, 5.7 rebounds, 4.1 points and 2.4 steals in seven games, including the 85-83 semifinal win against Edmonton on Saturday afternoon. Keith led the Rattlers’ comeback against the Stingers with an ‘and-one’ in the fourth quarter, finishing with 15 points in the contest. Ejim has averaged 9.0 points and 7.0 rebounds in five games since the move. They enter the final game hoping revenge is a dish best served with a championship trophy.

Three Versus Four
Saskatchewan and Hamilton were the third and fourth seed respectively coming into the playoffs. Both teams completed upsets on Saturday. While the Rattlers entered their semifinal as the lower-seeded team, they were 3-1 in the regular season against Edmonton and were playing in front of a boisterous home crowd. The Honey Badgers however, were 1-3 against the first-place River Lions and needed three players to score 20-plus points in order to pull off the upset. Player of the Game Xavier Rathan-Mayes recorded a double-double with a game highs of 27 points and 11 assists, while teammates Ricky Tarrant Jr. scored 22 points and Demetrius Denzel-Dyson registered 21 points, including five triples.

Home Cooking
The Rattlers came into CEBL Championship Weekend as the only postseason team to have a losing record at home (4-6). They can finish the year with a .500 record at SaskTel Centre if their Sunday ends with the hoisting of the trophy. There is no question that the Saskatchewan faithful helped push the Rattlers across the finish line in their win against Edmonton. The arena should be rocking on Sunday and will give energetic players like Keith an added boost.

The Big Three
If Rathan-Mayes, Denzel-Dyson and Tarrant Jr. can share the ball enough in 40 minutes, they have a chance to take the title. Together, they are the most explosive teammates in the CEBL. Tarrant Jr. averaged 21.8 points in the regular season against the Rattlers, including a season-best 33 points on May 16, and a season-low 11 points on July 27 (he scored just two points on June 5 versus Guelph but left the game after just 18 inutes). Denzel-Dyson has yet to score 20 points against Saskatchewan and is shooting just .242 (8-33) from beyond the arc. The Rattlers have yet to face Rathan-Mayes.

A Different Type of Rattlers
Saskatchewan is known as a defensive-minded team. Scoring is secondary for this hard-nosed squad coached by Greg Jockims. The Rattlers are second-worst in the league, averaging just 92.3 points per game, however Hamilton seems to bring the best out of them. In the four-game season series against the Honey Badgers, Saskatchewan has averaged 101.8 points, the highest mark against any CEBL opponent. In fact, the Rattlers have only hit the century mark seven times this season and four of those games came against Hamilton. Saskatchewan won the season-series 3-1.Just forty minutes left in the inaugural CEBL season. Who will be the first to hoist the championship trophy will depend on the who can play the type of game that got them this far. If the Rattlers can slow down the pace of the game and continue to score off transition, the one crowd will be celebrating well into the Saskatoon night. Should the Big Three find their groove, then the trophy will live in the Hammer and worst becomes first.

It’s time to #HoldCourt.

May 16, 2019 at Saskatchewan: Saskatchewan 113, Hamilton 95
Leading scorers: Hamilton (R. Tarrant Jr., 33), Saskatchewan (T. Dawson, 30)
Leading rebounders: Hamilton (M. Fraser, 8), Saskatchewan (T. Dawson / B. Massey, 10)

May 18, 2019 at Hamilton: Saskatchewan 98, Hamilton 85
Leading scorers: Hamilton (R. Tarrant Jr., 21), Saskatchewan (A. Campbell, 23)
Leading rebounders: Hamilton (R. Ejim, 11), Saskatchewan (C. Posthumus, 17)

July 12, 2019 at Saskatchewan: Hamilton 102, Saskatchewan 96
Leading scorers: Hamilton (J. Rocca, 28), Saskatchewan (L. Moore, 18)
Leading rebounders: Hamilton (D. Denzel-Dyson, 10), Saskatchewan (N. Webster-Chan, 10)

July 27, 2019 at Hamilton: Saskatchewan 100, Hamilton 79
Leading scorers: Hamilton (S. Carter, 20), Saskatchewan (A. Campbell, 19)
Leading rebounders: Hamilton (M. McIntosh, 7), Saskatchewan (S. Osayande, 10)