St. Leo School’s eighth grade basketball team won second place in a weekend basketball tournament held at St. George School in Erie.
 
“This was a great weekend for our team,” said head coach Tom Gilmore. “This is our first year in the tournament, and there were some top Erie teams like St. George, St. James and Strong Vincent. We ended up placing higher then all the teams from the Erie Diocese. We played extremely well, showing that we can play with anybody. I couldn’t be more proud of the kids.”
 
St. Leo scored their first win over Robert Benjamin Wiley Community Charter School, by a score of 35-28. The Lions notched a 33-29 win over St. George School later on Saturday. The win put St. Leo in the championship game against Erie Rise Leadership Academy on Sunday, which St. Leo lost 44-32.
 
Gilmore also gave credit to his assistant coach. “My counterpart is coach Shawn Geci. He does a tremendous job with the kids and keeps me grounded. We couldn’t do it without him.”
 
Gilmore added that the team had a special fan in their corner for the championship game. “Fr. Brian Vossler, who was previously the pastor at St. Leo, made an appearance in the stands. He stopped to chat with us. The kids were really excited about that. We even had a chance to attend Mass in his church on Saturday night, as a team, which is always a nice way for a Catholic school to round out a tournament.”
The St. Leo eighth graders will be playing in a tournament at St. Stephen School in Oil City this coming weekend.
 
The St. Leo eighth grade team includes Thomas Gilmore Jr, Shawn Geci, Jack Williams, Noah Cherry, Alex Gahr, Luke Eckert, Abbie Neubert, Percy MacDonald, Moe MacDonald, and Bobby Urmann.