The usual madness of March will elude the Langley Events Centre this week due to the pandemic. After celebrating its 75th anniversary last year, the sa国际传媒 high school basketball championship courts have fallen silent.
To fill the void, the LEC is free-streaming 12 of the classic past boys鈥� championship games at tfsetv.ca, beginning today at 6 p.m. with the Triple-A all-Island 1978 final between the Nanaimo Islanders and defending 1977 champion Oak Bay Bays from the Pacific Coliseum, won 71-62 by Nanaimo. That will be followed at 8 p.m. by the 1988 final won by the Richmond Colts over the Seaquam Seahawks.
The 1978 Islanders edged the 1988 Colts in the final of a recent virtual on-line simulated tournament, featuring what are considered the 16 best provincial high school hoops teams, to be crowned the greatest sa国际传媒 team of all-time.
鈥淚t鈥檚 so tough to judge something like that. It鈥檚 just people鈥檚 opinions,鈥� said Gerald Kazanowski, the breakout star from that 1978 Nanaimo team, who went on to lead sa国际传媒 to the semifinals in the 1984 L.A. Olympics and sixth place in the 1988 Seoul Olympics.
What is a non-virtual, real-life fact is that the 1978 Islanders-Bays final laid much of the foundation for the University of Victoria鈥檚 seven-year national championship run of the 1980s, with Gerald and Greg Kazanowski graduating from Nanaimo and Kelly Dukeshire from Oak Bay to star for the UVic dynasty.
鈥淲e beat Oak Bay but I have a lot of respect for that [Bays] team and coach Don Horwood,鈥� said Kazanowski, a 1983 NBA draft pick of the Utah Jazz, who played pro in Europe and Latin America.
鈥淢eanwhile, our coach John Levering, took a shy kid like me and taught him about passion and setting goals and helped turn him into a champion, pro and Olympian.鈥�
The 1992 Triple-A final, featuring eventual two-time NBA MVP Steve Nash leading St. Michael鈥檚 University School past Pitt Meadows, will stream Thursday at 8 p.m. The all-Island 2014 Double-A final between St. Michael鈥檚 and Lambrick Park will be shown Friday at 10 a.m.
Six girls鈥� sa国际传媒 high school hoops finals were streamed last week but none featured an Island team.
Kazanowski said he feels for the Grade 12s who won鈥檛 have their own stories to tell from the cancelled 2021 tournaments: 鈥淟ife happens, make the best of it, and stay focused on your future.鈥�
