Todd Jordan has gone to the heart of the Canadian Rockies to fill a few gaps in his UNBC Timberwolves lineup.
Jordan, head coach of the men's basketball squad, has recruited Neal Randhawa and Saje Gosal from Golden. Both players will join the Timberwolves this fall.
"They're both good-sized kids," said Jordan. "Sage is six-foot-four and Neal is six-foot-three. They're bigger wing guards and hard-working kids and both academically strong. It will be unlikely they'll play (much) in year one, but in the longer term in years two, three and four, they will contribute."
Randhawa and Gosal, who played for the Golden secondary Eagles, were both on the B.C. Under-16 team and played club ball in Calgary.
They have visited Prince George and UNBC's campus, and while the Timberwolves were preparing for the CIS Canada West playoffs in Kamloops in February, they had a chance to meet the team.
The Timberwolves will continue to play in the existing six-team Canada West Explorer Division for the 2015-16 season. But on Monday, Canada West announced changes to the 2016-17 season, when UNBC will play in a single conference.
Canada West said it will feature a 20-game regular-season schedule and each team will play four geographical or historical opponents every year, with games against six of the remaining 12 opponents every other year.
For UNBC, its annual opponents will be UBC, Fraser Valley (Abbotsford), Thompson Rivers (Kamloops) and Trinity Western (Langley).
Jordan doesn't mind the new format, as all the schools will have a chance to play each other in a four-year rotation. Over the rotation in the schedule, each team will play every team in the conference at least twice, and will visit every gym in Canada West at least once.
"With 17 teams with massive geography between them, it's hard to come up with a schedule that makes it 100 per cent perfect," said Jordan. "This is one of the best ideas they've had. To go back to the number of games against traditional, power schools, that's what we wanted, to get into being in a level playing field."
