The Portage Collegiate varsity basketball teams impressed many local fans in their home openers last night.

The Trojans were defeated in a hard-fought contest 55-47 against the Grant Park Pirates. Head coach Darin Arnold says he's seen plenty of bright spots from this young team already.

"Our first game was a blowout but we had some good spots, and today we had some good spots. We'll give Grant Park credit, they were a good team and played well. (The Trojans) have gotten down what we've tried to do. A lot of our mistakes were forcing a lot of stuff against their defence that wasn't there but the guys have proven to me that they know what they need to do. They just need to get better at decision-making while they do it."

He notes while there were a lot of positives last night, falling to 0-2 definitely isn't ideal. Arnold says this team's ceiling will fluctuate depending on how committed they are.

"We did a better job than we did Monday night of boxing out but we didn't chance after the ball. There were still a lot of people just watching on defence, rather than being active," Arnold continues. "If they want to compete and if they want to go leave it all on the line for us, that's going to make a big difference." 

The Saints, on the other hand, picked up a big win as they dominated Grant Park 57-12. Kaylee Perry led the way on the scoreboard as she finished with 14 points, while Lexi Henderson and Sage Driedger both ended up with eight.

Both the Saints and Trojans will be back in action on Monday as they host the Tech Voc Hornets, with the girls playing at 5:00 and the boys at 6:30.