Sands Scorpions head coach Matt McKay (crouching) isn't able to coach up his teamm during timeout this season, but the North Delta-based bench boss is hosting a series of online basketball clinics featuring coaches from all over North America. (Photo by Paul Yates property of Vancouver Sports Pictures 2021. All Rights Reserved)
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It’s a continental hoops cuisine! Matt McKay’s virtual Sands Basketball Clinics unite B.C. & North American coaches in the name of the game!

NORTH DELTA — They say that silence is deafening, and in perhaps the cruelest of ways, that was the auditory state most common among both high school basketball players and their coaches as each began 2021 by walking into gymnasiums normally teeming with the activity of a season in progress.“We all realized that last Wednesday […]

VIU's Tyus Barfoot (right) hugs teammate Landon Radliff after yet another Mariners' rally carried them past Vanier and into Saturday's CCAA championship final at the LEC. (Photo by Howard Tsumura property of VarsityLetters.ca 2019. All Rights Reserved)
Feature University Men's Basketball

CCAA Nationals Day 2: Magnificent Mariners do it again! In Friday’s Final Four, VIU rallies from 19 down to stun Montreal’s Vanier Cheetahs

LANGLEY— Their compass won’t let them down. For a second straight night here at the CCAA men’s national basketball championships, the Vancouver Island Mariners have stared down a double-digit defict and in the end, turned it to dust.

Battling knee issues throughout his career, Langara's fifth-year guard-forward Drake Downer (14) has been an unquestioned leader on a team which includes the likes of (left to right): Tyler Anderson, Tyson Brown and fellow senior Timmie Choi. (Photo by Howard Tsumura property of VarsityLetters.ca 2019. All Rights Reserved)
Feature University Men's Basketball

CCAA Nationals Day 2: Langara’s Drake Downer on his dozen-plus knee injuries and how he found the will to persevere

LANGLEY — Ask Drake Downer about perhaps the most battle-scarred right knee in recent B.C. high school and university basketball history, and he’s more than happy to give an aural history and guided tour.

As an exclamation mark on a game it won with a 36-point swing, VIU Mariners guard Tyus Barfoot puts down a late slam dunk against Calgary's SAIT Trojans. (Photo by Howard Tsumura property of VarsityLetters.ca 2019. All Rights Reserved)
In his third season with the Langara Falcons, former R.C. Palmer Griffin guard Antonio Jhuty has ascended to the No. 1 spot in the PacWest scoring race. (Photo by Dom Gagne property of Langara Falcons athletics 2019. All Rights Reserved)
In just his second season behind the bench as head coach, former TRU and UBC assistant Joe Enevoldson has New Westminster's Douglas College Royals back in the CCAA national tourney for the first time in 10 years. (Photo by Howard Tsumura property of VarsityLetters.ca_
Feature University Men's Basketball

One decade later: Signature wins over VIU Mariners give New West’s Douglas College Royals berth in CCAA national tourney

NEW WESTMINSTER — It’s Monday morning, following a weekend in which Canada’s reigning university basketball dynasty was brought to a grinding halt, and Joe Enevoldson seems a little out of breath as he answers a reporter’s phone call.