‘The Provincials!’ Pt. 1

By far the largest event of the year in high school athletics is the Sr. Boy’s Provincial Basketball Championships. 64 teams, in four 16 team tournaments, organized by school population, meet to decide who is the best at each level.

For the Grade 12’s these are the last games they will ever play in high school. For the winning teams and most outstanding players, the will go into the annals as among the best of all time.

This giant banner is hung at the entrance to the arena complex and honours players considered to be the best of their decade or era.

Lower left is from the first decade the 1940’s. (Note the knee pads). Lower right the 1950s.

Top left is arguably one of the greatest of all time: good enough to be one of only a couple of Canadians of that era to be drafted by the NBA. He was a classmate at university, a national team player, and my boss and fellow coach early in my career. He died far too soon. RIP Ron.

Top right is from the early ‘70’s, the first player from this tournament the play in the NBA. 6’10” Lars Hanson played for a short time with the Seattle Supersonics in their championship year, 1979.

The reason we went today was to see one of this era’s greats, grandson of blipper Dunnie, Nash Semeniuk. (Highlighted in extra) Unfortunately, Nash and his mates ran into a better team on the day, and were relegated to the consolation side of the draw, despite his 29 point performance.