By Howard Tsumura
Varsity Letters
COQUITLAM — He may still be only 17 years old, but ask Alex Birsan to name the NBA player who has perhaps been the most influential in terms of his approach to the game, and his response just confirms his old-school cool.
“Obviously, nowadays it’s Luka Dončić and (Nikola) Jokić,” the 6-foot-7 senior standout with Coquitlam’s Quad-A No. 7-ranked Centennial Centaurs begins. “But I don’t know if you know him…
“For me, it’s Vlade Divac,” Birsan continued of the Serbian centre who starred mostly with the Lakers and Kings, and who at 7-foot-1 distinguished himself over a 16-year Basketball Hall of Fame career as a pioneering passer amongst the first wave of ‘immigrating’ European bigs.
“He had this one move which I copied when I was a kid,” continued Birsan of Divac. “He would fake going one way and completely go another. And also he had that famous behind-the-head pass.”
Divac, of course, retired in 2005, three years before Birsan was born to sports-loving parents of both Romanian and Bosnian descent, so it makes it a little easier to romanticize that instead of standard bedtime fairy tales, he was instead put to bed to stories of Divac and Dražen Petrović… two players who stylistically and energetically represented the breadth of his on-court ambitions.
“Both of my parents were athletes,” he says, adding specifically that his Romanian-born dad Dan — a teacher at Coquitlam’s Pinetree Secondary — played professionally in his homeland, winning a national title with CSA Steaua Bucharest, while his Bosnian-born mom Silviga competed in shotput and discus for Partizan Belgrade in Serbia, winning a national title in the latter discipline. “They really enlightened me on how it is in the sports world. And I fell in love with basketball from the time I was a young kid. My dad put that ball in my hands and ever since, I’ve never doubted it. I want to pursue this as long as I can.”
Based on his current trajectory, which seems about as true north 90-degrees as you can get, Birsan looks like the kind of player who has a long career ahead of him.
There’s highlights galore, but the ones talking the loudest these days?
How about a 35.2 points-per-game scoring average buttressed by a beefy 14.2 rebounds with 3.4 assists and 3.0 blocks per contest?
Already this season with the Quad-A No. 7 Centaurs, he’s scored 40-plus points eight times, including 55 against Lord Tweedsmuir, 53 against Fleetwood Park, 46 against Belmont and 45 against Kitsilano. All of those aforementioned teams have been either ranked in the B.C. Quad-A Top 10 or honourable mention at some stage this season.
“I can honesty say that Alex’s will to win is outstanding, absolutely outstanding, and I’ve been coaching now for 37 years,” said Rob Sollero, the former Centennial head coach who has remained on the staff as an assistant. “He’s fiery. He’s legit. And his dunks are so emphatic… he got two technicals over the holidays at the Tamanawis Tournament for his dunks because they were so powerful.”
Indeed, off the court Birsan is a true gentleman, engaging in conversation and respectful at every turn.
Yet reference all of the hullabaloo which accompanies his propensity for rim rocking, and the young man who insists he’ll be a sports psychologist whenever his playing days are done, cops to having an alter-ego.
“Anger, yeah,” he begins. “Whenever I see the rim, I just want to hurt it. I go up and throw down with the most power I can. I channel my inner rage, you know, for whatever it may be.”
MORE TOOLS THAN A MECHANIC
The best basketball advice Alex Birsan ever received came from his father, and it’s stuck with him since he was a mini-dribbler.
“He emphasized versatility, being able to do all of the things on the court… to shoot, dribble, pass,” the younger Birsan says of his dad, Dan, who at 6-foot-9, was a mobile post-power forward over his 12-year pro career in Romania.
“He emphasized fundamentals over everything. He told me that if you master the fundamentals, then everything else would come.”
Clearly, they are words Birsan has taken to heart because if you ask any of those who have played a role in his development through both the club and high school delivery systems, it’s the first thing they mention.
“He’s a Swiss army knife, but a better version of a Swiss army knife,” says Drive Basketball co-founder and coach Pasha Bains, the former Richmond Colts star of the late 1990s who later played his college hoops in the ACC at Clemson before finishing at SFU and UBC. “Actually, I would describe him as a platinum Swiss army knife.”
Bains has coached Birsan since he was in the third grade, and after nearly a decade together, he’s watched how a young kid has continued to bring unbridled passion to the fore every time he steps on the floor.
And throughout his development, an evolving refinement of that energy has continued to manifest itself to the point where now Bains feels like a perfect balance has been struck between the two hemispheres of his basketball brain.
“He’s always been one of the best players in our whole program and he’s always been the best player on his team in that age group,” Bains says, “but the hardest thing we ever had to do was to try to calm him down in the games. But at the same time, I think that’s what makes him, right? He just wears his heart on his sleeve, and I think that’s what makes him so good.”
Centennial head coach Lucian Sauciuc, who himself was not only born in Romania, but also played for the Centaurs in high school, has been there throughout Birsan’s evolutionary path towards becoming a multi-dimensional five-position threat.
“I think what makes him so special is that he’s just so versatile and it’s so tough for defences to kind of match up with him because, you know, he’s not a traditional big where you just have to play him inside,” begins Sauciuc. “He can shoot it from the perimeter, he can dribble it. He’s gotten so much better at creating for others and the more unselfish he is, the more he gets the other guys going, the more he’s finding that the game opens up to him. He’s a pleasure to coach.”
This season’s Centaurs have had their ups and downs, but are playing their best ball of the season headed into the stretch drive to league, zone and provincial playoffs.
Birsan, guard Josh Onyango and gridiron transplant Leki Bloomfield, a 6-foot-4 two-way lineman, are the senior starters in a quintet which also features a pair of Grade 11s in guards Pouyan Ghadjahani and Ethan Toy. Among a host of others making up the rotation for coaches Sauciuc, Sollero and Alan Kaselj are senior guard Zach Kralj, and two other Grade 11s in forward Malory Jaune and guard Jay Zhao.
Centennial won its first five games of the season to place first at the Big Ticket invite in late November, but then lost their first two games at the Tsumura Basketball Invitational by 20-plus points before earning a split of its four games, all at the Langley Events Centre in early December.
In late December, a resurgence saw them win three of four at the Tamanawis Holiday Classic in Surrey, and in earlier this month they won three of four at the Terry Fox Legal Beagle invitational.
It was at the latter event that, one in which his team did not advance to the championship final, that Birsan was selected tournament MVP.
“They just said ‘The MVP is No. 5 from Centennial, Alex Birsan,’” Birsan remembers. “I was surprised because I thought they would have picked somebody from (tourney champ) Holy Cross. I would have been happy with a tournament all-star. But MVP? It was a great honour to receive it not being on the winning team.”
WALKING IN BIG FOOTSTEPS WITH FULL APPRECIATION
If you were holding a fantasy draft for the B.C. boys high school basketball program with the most talented big men, the Centennial Centaurs would have to be a part of anyone’s select group of schools.
You could start with 1972’s top-tiered two-time tourney MVP Lars Hansen, who at 6-foot-10 later played for the Washington Huskies and won an NBA championship ring with the Seattle SuperSonics in 1978-79.
Centennial’s 6-foot-9 Cam Aronetz was one of the province’s most dominant bigs and earned top-tiered B.C. first team all-star honours in helping the Centaurs to the top-tiered Final Four at the 1987 provincials under then-head coach Rich Chambers. Aronetz later starred at Simon Fraser under the late, great Stan Stewardson before being drafted as a pitcher by the Los Angeles Dodgers.
And over the past few seasons, the legacy has grown even stronger with back-to-back big men currently ensconced in NCAA Div. 1 careers south of the line.
The 6-foot-9 Dominic Parolin, who graduated from Centennial in 2020, is in his senior season at Boise State after beginning his Div. 1 career at Lehigh.
The 6-foot-11 K.C. Ibekwe, who graduated from Centennial in 2022, is in his senior season with the Pacific Tigers under former Carleton Ravens head coach Dave Smart after spending previous seasons with Oregon State and Washington.
Birsan may have heard all about the likes of Divac and Dražen Petrović in his very formative years.
Yet there was a time when his dad was a teacher at Centennial when Birsan would find himself in the gym after school watching the likes of Parolin and Ibekwe up close, an experience which allowed him to begin projecting what he might someday be able to do with a lot of hard work and dedication.
“I remember I used to go to Dom Parolin’s games and that’s when I thought to myself ‘I want to be like him one day’. And yeah, I did watch K.C., and I know K.C. personally as well. I thought to myself ‘You know, I’m gonna have some big shoes to fill because Centennial has such a rich basketball history and I was like ‘When it’s my time, I want to make an impact as well. I want to make a big impact and try and win a provincial banner.’”
Alex Birsan celebrates his family roots. His school pride allows him to fully appreciate the greats who have come before him.
And with a passion and love for the game fostered by the European background of his parents, B.C. high school basketball fans can look to him this season as a player, who on this level, is their version of a Dončić, a Jokić, and even an old-school Divac.
Pasha Bains sees even deeper old-school Euro influences.
“He’s got a little Peja (Stojakovic) in his game,” he says of the Serbian sharp-shooter who played for a handful of NBA teams, most notably the Sacramento Kings (1998-06).
“He definitely has some Dino Radja in the way he just has the motor and he’s not soft… and he’s tough,” he continues while referencing the 6-foot-11 Croatian who played for the Boston Celtics and within a much more defensive-minded NBA in the mid-90’s, was fractions away from averaging 20 points and 10 rebounds in the 1995-96 season. “And then, you know, he’s got some Jokić in him too. He’s got a really nice spin move in the post. He doesn’t play like a B.C. kid or even a North American, in my opinion.”
Versatility is Alex Birsan’s calling card, and as he plays out the final weeks of his high school career, his game is hitting on the kinds of cylinders that make him, on so many nights, impossible to describe.
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