Surrey school hosts top U.S. cager
You may not know Jacob Cofie's name just yet, but there's a good chance you're familiar with the universities chasing him.
Cofie is a six-foot-nine Grade 11 forward with the Eastside Catholic Crusaders of Sammamiish, Wash., and he's said to be receiving interest from NCAA Division I programs like Ohio State, Oregon, USC, Washington, UNLV and Colorado.
Eastside Catholic is slated to face Surrey's Semiahmoo Thunderbirds, who are the No. 1 team in the current Quad A provincial boys' basketball rankings, in an exhibition today at 7:30 p.m. at the Langley Events Centre.
The website 247 Sports ranks Cofie as the No. 2 player in the Class of 2024 players in Washington, behind only point guard Zoom Diallo of Tacoma's Curtis Senior.
Semiahmoo has several returnees from last year's squad that fell 72-57 in the Quad A provincial final to the Burnaby South Rebels.
The game isn't part of the Tsumura Basketball Invitational, the 16-team tournament named after longtime Province sports reporter Howard Tsumura that's also going on this weekend at the LEC.
The TBI semifinals are slated for 3:30 and 5 p.m. today.
The championship goes at 8:30 p.m. on Saturday.
BIG TICKET WRAPS WITH ABBY WINS
Ticket resale service Venue Kings and real estate developer Onni Group teamed up to give out $1,000 scholarships to 20 girls and 20 boys players at the end of the Big Ticket Tournament, which wrapped up this weekend at Abbotsford Senior.
“We had fantastic applicants, some kids working really hard to be great candidates. It was exciting to help out 40 kids,” said tournament organizer Anthony Beyrouti, the longtime coach of North Vancouver's Argyle Pipers girls' team and also founder of Venue Kings.
The tournament featured 112 boys and girls teams in senior, junior and Grade 8. The Abbotsford Panthers captured both the senior boys' and girls' titles.
The Big Ticket took a hiatus last year, but Beyrouti wants it to become a season-opening tradition, much like the HSBC and then-Telus tournaments that tipped off the basketball year in the past, and gave out scholarships.
HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL ENDS
High school football wrapped up with its finals on the weekend.
It also handed out some year-end hardware.
Micah Barker, who's a running back with Abbotsford's Robert Bateman Timberwolves, was named academic player of the year, while Ryan Huang, who's a running back with Burnaby's St. Thomas More Knights, won the community involvement scholarship.