It’s not official yet but as far as sewing up a U SPORTS Canada West men’s basketball playoff spot the UNBC Timberwolves have that needle threaded.
The top 12 advance to the postseason and with the Saskatchewan Huskies in town tonight and Saturday to face the T-wolves, UNBC in in that playoff group. The T-wolves currently rank 11th in the Canada West standings with an 8-10 record, one win better than the 12th-place Fraser Valley Cascades.
UNBC holds the tiebreaker over 13th-place UBC-Okanagan (6-12) and while there is an outside shot 14th-place Thompson Rivers could catch UNBC, the WolfPack (4-12) have four games left but would have to sweep Mount Royal this weekend and win both games next week against top-ranked Victoria.
The T-wolves would much rather end the suspense and pull off a win or two over the ninth-place (10-8) Huskies this weekend.
“Some crazy stuff would have to happen for us not to get in,” said T-wolves head coach Todd Jordan. “A lot of stuff would have to go wrong. That being said, obviously we want to be playing well going into playoffs and make sure we take those scenarios out of everybody’s hands and put them into ours.
“Saskatchewan is a tough physical team and they’ve been hard to score against this year. They’re really physical with their guards and they have some pretty athletic kids playing on the perimeter and a bit of size up front. The key for us is we will have to be really disciplined offensively as far as being detail-focused with how we’re executing.”
The T-wolves have three graduating players who are playing in their last home games this weekend at the Northern Sport Centre. Fifth-year forwards Spencer Ledoux and Chris Ross are in their fifth and final year of eligibility as student athletes and third-year guard Darren Hunter is moving on to law school.
Through 18 games, Ledoux has shot 132-for-239 from the field. The six-foot-seven Kamloops native is comfortable making himself an immovable object when he has a chance to set up under the net.
“Spencer is one of the best post players we’ve ever had in our program, we’ve been able to throw the ball down to him on the block and he’s been able to manufacture baskets for us,” said Jordan. “We’re going to lose his leadership and lose his scoring, which is going to hurt.”
Jordan calls Ross one of the hardest-working players he’s ever coached and his three-point accuracy gives the T-wolves a reliable outside threat. He leads the team with 41 treys on 112 attempts for a 34.2 per cent average.
“He a really tenacious defender and brings that energy every day in practice,” said Jordan. “He draws the tough defensive assignments and he’s had an awesome career here, for him and Spencer, six years with the COVID year.”
Hunter has played just three years but has been with the team for four, including the cancelled COVID season of 2020-21, and he now finishing up his degree. He’s in the top three on his team for drawing fouls and when he gets to the line he rarely misses, sinking 47 of 56 free throw attempts this season.
“He’s a really competitive guy who has been a sparkplug for us,” said Jordan. “He has an edge to him and over the years sometimes he goes over the edge a little bit. He’s been a really good teammate for the guys too, he does some peer tutoring, and especially in the last two years he’s played a lot of minutes for us.”
Tonight’s game starts at 8 p.m., with the opening tip-off for Saturday’s rematch set for 7 p.m.
The UNBC women host Saskatchewan tonight at 6 p.m. and Saturday at 5 p.m.
