Three Vancouver schools and one Surrey school crowned provincial basketball champions in Langley

BC School Sports Boys Basketball Provincial Championships wrapped up Saturday, March 11, at Langley Events Centre with three Vancouver schools (1A King David, 2A King George and 3A St. Patrick) and Surrey’s Semiahmoo (4A) capturing their respective titles.

The 64-team championships – broken into four 16-team tiers – got underway on Wednesday, March 8 and ran through Saturday, March 11 with 128 games at the LEC.

Number-10 ranked Langley Christian, the only local team, went 2-2, losing to the eventual 2A champions, No. 2-seeded King George Dragons in the quarterfinals to place seventh out of 16.

Dragons went on to defeat No. 1 seed Brentwood College in the 2A final, deploying a dominating defence which held their opponent to a mere 10 points in the opening 20 minutes.

By the time the final buzzer sounded, the scoreboard read ‘King George 63 Brentwood College 33’ and the Dragons had secured the first provincial basketball title in the history of the Vancouver school.

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In the 4A final, a record-breaking sellout crowd watched an all-Surrey match pit the Semiahmoo Thunderbirds against the Fleetwood Park Dragons, with Semiahmoo winning 71-40.

The title was the first senior boys basketball championship in school history.

Thunderbirds head coach Les Brown said the team’s loss in the 2022 title game to the Burnaby South Rebels was a valuable learning lesson for his team, which returned almost the entire roster, many of whom enter Grade 12 next year.

“We used that as motivation all year, knowing that we had to be the tougher team, hungry for every possession, especially in a game like this: possession is gold, and you have to take care of the ball,” the coach said.

Brown said once his team (the No. 1 seed) overcame their slow start, they were able to take advantage of their Surrey rivals in the second quarter.

“We just pushed the tempo a bit, and to be honest, Fleetwood looked like they were getting tired,” the coach said, referencing the fact Fleetwood was coming off tough victories over Vancouver College Fighting Irish in the quarter-final round and then the Oak Bay Bays in the semi.

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Much of the Semiahmoo offence came courtesy of Cole Bekkering (26 points, 12 rebounds) and Torian Lee (18 points, 9 rebounds, 5 assists). Bekkering was selected the Quinn Keast Foundation Player of the Game.

Lee would won the Most Valuable Player award, while teammate Andre Juco was chosen the Best Defensive Player. Bekkering, Aaron Uppal (Fleetwood Park), Nash Semeniuk (Kelowna), Adam Olsen (Elgin Park) and Griffin Arnatt (Oak Bay) were chosen to First Team All-Stars.

The Second Team All-Stars consisted of Semiahmoo’s Juco and Marcus Flores, Izaec Oppal (Fleetwood Park), Hayden Sansalone (Abbotsford Senior) and Mikyle Malabuyoc (Vancouver College).

Kelowna’s Walker Sodaro was the recipient of the Braich Foundation Most Inspirational Player while the Kelowna Owls team won the Most Inspirational Team Award, the W.J. Mouat Hawks won the Wink Willox Most Sportsmanlike Team Award and Fleetwood Park won the School Spirit Award.