Ottawa Gee-Gees’ Caleb Agada has his breakout at CIS Final 8

Caleb Abada went from practically being a DNP to MVP, which isn't supposed to happen this late in a season. When you talk about — everyone do your best Iverson — practice, well, what the rookie did to pull Ottawa out of second gear on Friday makes perfect sense.

The third-seeded Gee-Gees wore down McGill 82-70 in the CIS Final 8 quarter-final. That was according to form, except for the 18-year-old wing who gave Ottawa an adrenaline shot in the first half. Agada, who chose Ottawa in part since he's cut from the same cloth as fifth-year star Warren Ward, saw the floor for only 12 minutes during Ottawa's run through the Ontario playoffs. With Ottawa lagging on Friday, he came up with 11 points in 16 minutes. He might not replicate that Saturday or Sunday, but it only takes one.

"Coach Jimmy [James Derouin] always gives me a chance every single game, but I sometimes struggle to find my role and my place in it," the 18-year-old Burlington, Ont., native said. "Today, I brought the energy. That was what needed, so I was able to contribute."

The Final 8 is about the what-can-you-do-for-me-today, not upside. Agada was highly recruited out of Burlington Assumption Catholic last spring, but he hasn't been in Derouin's regular rotation. But Ottawa was having trouble with McGill and its four-guard look, particularly hot-shooting Vincent Dufort (16 points). Having the 6-foot-4 Agada with his length on the perimeter helped. Meantime, Agada jazzed the Gee-Gees with a leaping tip-in and a three-pointer that put them ahead at the half.

"He has all the tools and he has a motor — he just keeps going and going and going," said Ward, who had game highs of 23 points and 11 rebounds, including a trey that put the game out of reach at 61-48 with 5:32 remaining. "I’ll praise him to the death but I think Coach Jimmy deserves all the credit getting us ready to play."

'We don't win this game without him'

It was no small roles, only small actors deal for Ottawa.

“Sometimes as a coach you just gotta play a hunch and Caleb’s been doing a great job in practice," Derouin said. "When you back up a guy like Warren Ward sometimes you don’t get a chance to show how much you improved over the course of the season. And we talked this week about the fact that with Vince Dufort at the 4, who’s more of a guard than a post player, we knew that we might have to go with our smaller lineup.

"To be honest with you I just had a gut feeling that Caleb was the guy to give us some energy. In the first half, when we picked up the pressure a little bit with him on the floor, I thought that was a big turning point and he’s an energy guy and we needed energy at that point. We had 19 points or whatever at that point [midway through the second quarter] and we were just really struggling but what can I say, the kid hasn’t even turned 19 years old yet, he’s a pure freshman right out of high school

"Just an incredible performance and you know what, we don’t win this game without him today, that’s for sure.”

Agada, who won't even turn 19 until Aug. 31, chose Ottawa in part to learn on the job from Ward. Both profile similarly — prototype Canadian university wings who can get to the rim or shoot a velvety three.

"I feel like we had the two greatest wing players in the country [Ward and guard Johnny Berhanemeskel], one of them being in his fifth year," Agada said. "For my first year, I just wanted to go against him in practice, get ready for the years to come."

If it means some tough love, Agada is all for absorbing it with the gentle good humour required of rookies.

"It's exactly like that, If I do something good I'll acknowledge it but if I do something bad he'll tell me about it," says Agada, whose introduction to hoops as a child came from his mum, Susan Agada, taking him to the YMCA. "He'll remind me that I'm a first-year and he'll keep my head from growing too much."

Good to hear, but it takes some ego to believe you can come off the bench and change a game. Especially at 18 years old.

Neate Sager is a writer for Yahoo! Canada Sports. Follow him on Twitter @neatebuzzthenet. Please address any questions, comments or concerns to btnblog@yahoo.ca.