Mackenzie Pool (top, centre) elected to stay in Canada to play her university volleyball. The Alberta Pandas couldn't be happier. (Photo by Ken Pool for Varsity Letters 2022. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Girls Volleyball University Women's Volleyball

Our 13th annual edition: Who are B.C.’s Top 15 Grade 12 girls volleyball players? Check out our 2021-22 Dream Team!

LANGLEY — Pandemic or not, Varsity Letters has never failed to deliver what has become one of our most eagerly-anticipated features, and that’s why we’re happy to bring you our 13th straight edition of B.C.’s Top 15 high school volleyball players.Last year, even with the entire season cancelled due to COVID, our unflappable panel of […]

Back at Notre Dame and prepping for high school graduation this spring, Jugglers' standout Mackenzie Pool has prepped for a post-secondary and international career by spending the past two season's with Volleyball Canada's National Excellence Program. (Photo by Angela Rivera property of Notre Dame athletics 2022. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Girls Volleyball University Women's Volleyball

Notre Dame’s Mackenzie Pool: B.C. Girls Volleyball 2021-22 Player of the Year, a study in impassioned learning on & off court, makes Alberta Pandas her next stop!

VANCOUVER — Just as she’s done in laying the academic foundation for a potential future in law school, Mackenzie Pool has brought a student’s curiosity to everything she’s accomplished on the volleyball court as one of Canada’s up-and-coming young stars.And in keeping with that theme, it’s no stretch to say that on her way to […]

What a memory! Lord Tweedsmuir's Arjun Samra is carried around the court at the Langley Events Centre just prior to being named the 2019 B.C. Quad A tournament MVP. We're looking for some of your fondest as March Madness inches closer. (Photo by Wilson Wong 2019. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Boys Basketball High School Girls Basketball

March Madness comes to the LEC! Attn: Past players, coaches and media members, too… share your favourite B.C. boys or girls tourney memories with us via video!

Hey Varsity Letters’ readers, here’s a note from all of the dedicated people working behind the scenes at the Langley Events Centre who are determined to make March Madness as special as it deserves to be following last season’s cancelled 2020-21 provincial basketball championship tournaments:LANGLEY — With the Junior Basketball Provincial Invitational Tournaments and the […]

Kelowna Owls head coach head coach Harry Parmar will be putting in the miles this week with the rest of his team as B.C.'s No. 9-ranked team faces three fellow Top 10 squads in the Lower Mainland Thursday through Saturday (Photo by Paul Yates property of Vancouver Sports Pictures 2020. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Boys Basketball

Kelowna’s No. 9 Quad-A Owls make southern migration! With trio of Top 10 foes scheduled, coach Parmar says ‘Our goal is still to make it to March 12!’

Few high school teams can rival the Kelowna Owls senior boys basketball in terms of kilometres travelled over the course of a season.Yet with the pandemic and the flooding playing havoc on its primary method of preparing for the annual grind that is the B.C. senior boys Quad-A basketball championships next month, the stalwart KSS […]

Duchess Park's Cole Laing and the rest of the Condors continued to hold down the No. 3 ranking in this week's latest B.C. Triple A Top 10. (Photo by Howard Tsumura property of Varsity Letters 2021. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Boys Basketball

B.C. boys high school basketball rankings 02.08.22 edition: With playoff fever in the air, there’s new No. 1’s at Triple- and Single-A!

LANGLEY — It’s that special time of the basketball season as league play wraps up and playoffs begin to take centre stage.With that said, here are the latest B.C. senior boys high school basketball rankings over a week in which a pair of new No. 1’s emerged.Surrey’s Elgin Park Orcas moved to the top of […]

The St. Patrick's Celtics and Byrne Creek Bulldogs are each a part of the B.C. junior boys basketball rankings issued Tuesday. (Photo by Wilson Wong 2021. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Boys Basketball

B.C. junior boys Top 10 basketball rankings 02.08.22 edition: Surrey’s Elgin Park Orcas surge from unranked to No. 7 in most topsy-turvy poll of season!

LANGLEY — The B.C. boys junior basketball championships are set to tip off Feb. 26 at the LEC, and as we hit the stretch drive there is nothing much to report except the most topsy-turvy stretch of the entire campaign thus far.Only two of the Top 10 spots remained static, headed by No. 1 Vancouver […]

Byrne Creek's Marcell Sherwood (left, 13) and teammate Clifford Ocampo battle against St. Patrick's Joey Panghulan during senior boys basketball game Feb. 3, 2022 in Burnaby. (Photo by Howard Tsumura property of Varsity Letters 2022. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Boys Basketball

A Sunday Read: Why Byrne Creek’s Marcell Sherwood helps us all better cherish our bounce-back season of B.C. high school basketball!

BURNABY — Throughout the COVID-cancelled 2020-21 season, we wondered openly and talked aloud of just what was being lost by the thousands upon thousands of student-athletes across this province who were denied the myriad of benefits which come from taking part in school-based sports.Well, the answer has come this season in all of the ways […]

Seaquam's Amar Thiara (left) looks to dish in the face of defensive pressure from Argyle's Nathalie Francis during the Tsumura Basketball Classic in December of 2021. A re-birth in girls basketball at Seaquam has both its senior and junior varsity teams each sitting in the Top 10 rankings as March Madness approaches. (Photo by Howard Tsumura property of Varsity Letters 2022. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Girls Basketball

Seaquam revels in a girls basketball renaissance! The Seahawks of Sunshine Hills bring long-lost, late-1980’s vibe back to their North Delta neighbourhood!

NORTH DELTA — When it comes to senior varsity girls basketball, the high school from that North Delta neighbourhood known as Sunshine Hills is finding out how good it feels to find its place in the sun.When rankings were released earlier this week, not only was the Seaquam Seahawks senior girls team ranked at No. […]

The Langley Christian Lightning seem ready to make a third run at the thus-far elusive B.C. senior girls Double A basketball championship title this March at the Langley Events Centre. It's a quest being led by the team's talented trio of seniors (left to right) Taelor Coxford, Sydney Bradshaw and Lainey Shelvey. (Photo graphic by Gabriel Lynn, photos by Howard Tsumura property of Varsity Letters 2022. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Girls Basketball

The ‘Strikes Thrice’ magic of the Langley Christian Lightning! In a tier-free girls high school basketball world, might Double-A powers be BC’s No. 1 overall team?

LANGLEY — Imagine a B.C. girls high school basketball world without any tiers of classification.Instead, replace it with a soup pot of sorts in which every team in the province is thrown together to form a chowder-like broth.Bring to a boil.Cover.Simmer.Let the cream rise to the top.And when you lift that cover, who might you […]

After her game-high 31 points on Tuesday, Riverside's Avery Sussex is averaging 23 ppg in two meetings this season against the crosstown rival Terry Fox Ravens. (Photo by Wilson Wong 2021. All Rights Reserved)
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Riverside stocks its mint from the free-throw line! Quad-A No. 1 Rapids make their trips count in win over crosstown No. 3 Terry Fox Ravens!

LANGLEY — The Riverside Rapids may have forgotten to bring their vaunted three-point shooting game to Tuesday’s second round in the Battle of PoCo.Yet in the end, the Quad-A No. 1 Rapids simply exchanged an icy time from distance for a white-hot one from the charity stripe en route to a decisive 88-60 win over […]