Adam Olsen of Surrey’s Elgin Park Orcas faced Vancouver’s St. Patrick’s Celtics in the 2022 B.C. Triple-A championship final last March at the Langley Events Centre. (Photo by Paul Yates property of Vancouver Sports Pictures 2022. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Boys Basketball University Men's Basketball

A phenom for the future, UBC Thunderbirds basketball spreads its wingspan and welcomes Elgin Park’s 6-foot-7 guard/wing Adam Olsen to War Memorial Gym for 2023-24 season!

VANCOUVER — Adam Olsen is all business when it comes to the level of compete he will bring to the UBC Thunderbirds basketball team next season.In fact if there was a metric capable of measuring just such an intangible among B.C.’s graduating high school Class of 2023, the 6-foot-7 guard/wing Olsen might well sit at […]

One of the best UBC head coach Kevin Hanson has coached is Jadon Cohee. This season Cohee returns after a brief absence as one of the team's assistant coaches and will bring the energy on the bench Friday as SFU pays a visit to War Memorial Gymnasium. (Photo by Howard Tsumura property of VarsityLetters.ca 2020. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Boys Basketball University Men's Basketball

Buchanan Cup 2022: UBC hoops notes include the return of Jadon Cohee, our look at three rising ‘Birds in Luka Lizdek, Nikola Guzina, Triston Matthews and more!

VANCOUVER —Kevin Hanson loves the fact that his 2022-23 Thunderbirds are getting a great taste of post-season atmosphere before the conference season even gets a chance to tip off.On Friday, a little over two months after the ‘Birds kicked it all off in front of a near-capacity home crowd of 2,103 on Aug. 16 with […]

UBC Thunderbirds' fourth-year guard James Woods (left) turns a corner on UNLV's Elijah Parquet en route to a 33-point performance and 'Birds win in the team's season opener in mid August. (Photo by Howard Tsumura property of Varsity Letters 2022. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Boys Basketball University Men's Basketball

Buchanan Cup 2022: For UBC’s James Woods, a career defined by beating the odds makes ‘Boy Wonder’ a well-earned nickname!

VANCOUVER — Deep down in his basketball soul, James Woods has always been Boy Wonder.It’s the nickname he picked up before he was old enough to shave, before he even started to play high school basketball for Langley’s Walnut Grove Gators.And on Friday night (7:30 p.m.), when he pulls on his No. 11 UBC jersey […]

Former Tamanawis Wildcat and Fraser Valley Cascade big man Sukhman Sandhu has brought a revelatory skill package to his first season as a UBC Thunderbird. Despite the stops and starts of the 2021-22 Canada West season, Sandhu and fellow UBC newcomer James Woods have helped set the 'Birds in place for a productive post season. (Photo by Richard Lam property of UBC athletics 2022. All Rights Reserved)
Feature University Men's Basketball

As UBC Thunderbirds host UFV Cascades on Friday, the trick in a 2021-22 Canada West hoops season of stops and starts is finding a way to stay in rhythm with your routine!

VANCOUVER — You’re the head coach of a Canada West men’s or women’s basketball program, and as the most disjointed regular-season campaign in conference history does its best to wind towards an organized conclusion, one question seems to keeping topping all others in terms of relevancy.Between re-scheduled games and extended byes, what’s the best way […]

With a capacity crowd of 1,600 taking in the sights, SFU's Jordan Lyons scores two of his nine points on the night Saturday against UBC in the Buchanan Cup. (Photo by Wilson Wong property of SFU athletics 2021. All Rights Reserved)
Feature University Men's Basketball

Buchanan Cup 2021: The rivalry returns as a sell-out crowd of 1,600 packs Simon Fraser’s West Gym to watch the hosts top UBC Thunderbirds 90-82!

BURNABY MOUNTAIN — As Steve Hanson made his way across campus Saturday evening for the biggest men’s basketball game at SFU in recent memory, he just knew that nobody was in for an ordinary night.“When I got here at 5:45 (p.m.), I could already hear the 400 people who lined up,” Simon Fraser’s head coach […]

UBC guard Grant Audu has paid his dues and honed his game and enters the 2021-22 season as a true team leader. (Photo by Richard Lam property of UBC athletics 2021. All Rights Reserved)
Feature University Men's Basketball

UBC men’s hoops 2021-22: A new season tips off Thursday with game-ready additions as defending Canada West champ ‘Birds ready for small-ball or tall-ball!

VANCOUVER — They are not exactly a team shrouded in mystery, yet on the night of the final sleep before opening the 2021-22 Canada West men’s basketball season, it’s impossible to have a genuine handle on just what kind of team the UBC Thunderbirds are going to be.And you can take that right down to […]

SFU's Steve Hanson (right) and UBC's Kevin Hanson may not be related, but the two men's head basketball coaches are linked through the programs they guide and the depth of history their programs share. On Nov. 20, after six years on the shelf, the two will lead their teams into a Buchanan Cup showdown as part of the SFU Showdown atop Burnaby Mountain. (Photos by Richard Lam and Howard Tsumura property of UBC athletics and Varsity Letters 2021. All Rights Reserved)
Feature University Men's Basketball

Simon Fraser vs. UBC: The classic men’s B.C. university basketball rivalry is re-born! Mark down Nov. 20 at SFU for a rowdy Buchanan Cup tip-off!

BURNABY — For once in a long while the basketball stars at Simon Fraser and UBC have aligned.The end result?The Lower Mainland’s longest standing men’s basketball rivals have agreed to make Saturday, Nov. 20 the date for the resumption of the classic Buchanan Cup series, this edition seeing the Thunderbirds traveling up Burnaby Mountain to […]

UBC's Grant Audu was drafted by the CEBL's Fraser Valley Bandits on Wednesday, and will sandwich in a pro season this summer in Abbotsford before returning to War Gym a seasoned vet this fall. (Photo by Richard Lam property of UBC athletics 2021. All Rights Reserved)
Feature University Men's Basketball

Grant Audu: UBC basketball’s rising leader vows to soak up his pro experience with the Fraser Valley Bandits

VANCOUVER — There is so much that Grant Audu can do on a basketball court, that for his entire university career, he’s been cast in a series of demanding roles.The UBC Thunderbirds’ rising fourth-year forward has not only made each of those his own, in the process of doing so he’s shown himself to be […]

Thirty years ago this month, UBC's J.D. Jackson (centre) played on the same floor at B.C. Place Stadium as UNLV superstars Stacey Augmon (left) and Larry Johnson. (Photo graphic by Gabriel Lynn property of Varsity Letters 2020. All Rights Reserved)
Feature High School Boys Basketball University Men's Basketball

A Sunday Read: Why Dec. 1, 1990 – the day the UNLV Rebels came to town – was the day Vancouver came of age as a basketball city!

VANCOUVER — I can still remember the day that the late, great Jim Taylor, the newspaper sports columnist of my youth and later a co-worker at The Province newspaper, invited me over to his Vancouver home so that I might conduct an interview for a feature story I wanted to write on him for my […]

The simple idea of collecting memories from its vast tree of alums has helped bring the UBC men's basketball program closer together than ever, despite the global pandemic. Pictured clockwise from bottom left are UBC stars Ron Thorsen (with ball), Paul Johannson and Kevin Hanson, and J.D. Jackson (14). (Photos property of UBC athletics 2020. All Rights Reserved. Photo collage by Gabriel Lynn)
Feature University Men's Basketball

A Sunday Read: How the storytellers of UBC men’s basketball wrote their own history and strengthened bonds in a time of disconnect!

VANCOUVER — In these most disconnected and fractured of times, when our most basic instinct of reaching out to others in an act of the heart is so often compromised by the frustration of new realities, here is a story about finding connection.“Early in COVID, I would be out on my walks… I was doing […]