Pronghorns want to join the discussion

The University of Lethbridge Pronghorns men’s basketball team would like to be the equivalent of water cooler talk around the Canada West.

The Pronghorns open their season tonight when they host the Brandon Bobcats at 8 p.m. at the 1st Choice Savings Centre.

After battling their way to within one game of a berth in the Canada West final-four before bowing out to the Alberta Golden Bears in the quarterfinals, the Horns now look to further cue the conversation by not only returning to where they wound up at the end of February, but surpassing it.

However, in a late-winter playoff run that also included the Horns first playoff home games in nearly two decades, don’t expect Pronghorns head coach Mike Hansen and his returnees to be conjuring up warm and fuzzy memories.

“I know it’s easy to look at last year in terms of a historial context and say that’s our first playoff win in 17 years,” said Hansen. “But for our guys, we were really disappointed in the finish. We lost a three-game series at the U of A and unfortunately we suffered a couple of injuries that really hurt us and Dejon (Burdeaux) was slowed. We felt we should have beaten them and they went on to win the Canada West. So for us, we don’t look back at last year fondly, we look back at last year as a disappointment and I think guys are fuelled by that and know we’re that close to being in the national conversation and that’s where we want to be.”

That starts tonight with the Bobcats as some familiar faces return to the fold along with some new ones.

“To get our core back from last year and then to be able to add (Saren) Westrop and (Kyle) Peterson, two veteran guys, one coming off a mission and one coming back from the U.S.” said Hansen.

“We’ve added a couple of nice pieces in (Mark) Rodehutskors and (Awak) Piom, who are coming into their first year. So I’m really excited about the mix of this team. They’ve shown a lot of potential and when we’ve been healthy we’ve been able

to compete with anybody in the country. The key is, and every team goes through it, in the preseason you’re knicked up and banged up and right now we’re focused on trying to get healthy and ready for this weekend.”

Burdeaux returns for his fifth academic year.

“We feel pretty good,” he said. “Especially coming from down south, it shows the potential we have as a team. It’s really exciting for the season to be starting, it’s what we’ve worked all summer for.

“We look good. I’m one of the old guys now, so (we have) a lot of new guys coming in, getting after it and playing hard. It’s exciting.”