Teen work raises nation’s profile
Breakthrough performances in under-19 worlds deliver message for now and future
A group of delirious teenagers mugging for the cameras, the maple leaf proudly unfurled in front of them, gold medals hanging from their necks. World champions. The first global gold medallists in the history of Canadian basketball in a full FIBA competition delivered the defining moment of 2017 for the sport in this country.
The triumph by the men’s under-19 team in Egypt was the undisputed high point and marked the continued ascent of Canadian basketball around the world — both genders in most age groups — reaffirming the contention that the golden age of the game is upon us.
There were blips — the senior men stumbled through parts of the year — but the overall feeling is that the national program is experiencing a rebirth.
“I think our expectations are vastly different than they were in the past,” Roy Rana, head coach of the goldmedal team and now interim head coach of the senior program, said after Canada beat Italy 79-60 in the under-19 final.
“We go into every tournament thinking we have a legitimate shot to win a medal. And now seeing we’ve had this success, that we can win it all, means that our expectations have risen.”
As well they should, given the year that Canada had in global competition and FIBA Americas events.
The junior men’s gold was by far the highlight — a coming-out party for young Duke-bound phenom R.J. Barrett and a handful of his teammates — but it was not Canada’s only success.
The women’s under-19 team made its own history, winning the bronze medal at its world championship, the first time a women’s age-group team has climbed a FIBA medal podium.
Led by Ryerson coach Carly Clarke and 16-year-old phenom Laeticia Amihere, the teenagers represent the next wave of the Canadian women’s program, which had another banner year.
The senior women, ranked fifth in the world and coming off successive top-eight finishes at the Rio and London Olympics, plus a fifth-place showing at the 2014 world championships, easily qualified for the 2018 World Cup by sweeping the competition at the FIBA Americas tournament in Argentina.
As well, the men’s and women’s under-17s qualified easily for their world championships next year, continuing a string of impressive agegroup performances.
Long thought to be the marquee program of the organization, the senior men’s team, however, is still trying to find its way back to international relevance after years of strug- gles. The men played one exhibition tournament in Argentina in late August. A makeshift roster finished with a 1-2 record and failed to advance past the group stage.
They are now in the middle of trying to qualify for the 2019 World Cup, which would be the first major global competition the team has played in since the 2010 world championship.
Canada played a senior men’s game at home in an international competition for the first time since 1994 and easily beat Bahamas in Halifax to begin the long process, but lost to the Dominican Republic three nights later.
Qualifying continues in February with road games against Bahamas and the U.S. Virgin Islands before home dates in late June and early July.
Putting together a consistent roster is virtually impossible given that NBA players and Canadians on EuroLeague teams aren’t available for the majority of the first-round games.
It’s left to a group that tests the depth of the program to get the job done.
“We’re talking about how far Canada Basketball has come, and I think the only thing left for us to do is win at this level,” veteran guard Brady Heslip said before the game in Halifax.
“I think we have to win and we have to prove ourselves, and we have to establish ourselves as a top-five, top-10 country in the world. I think that’s where we should be, and this is the first step.”