Nanaimo Timbermen draft pick Paul Brebber made it this far playing a tough, hard-nosed game. Now he’ll try to bring it to the highest level of summer lacrosse.
Nanaimo’s Brebber was the first choice of the senior A Coastal Windows Timbermen in last week’s Western Lacrosse Association draft.
The Timbermen feel he can step right in and contribute, and that’s what he’ll try to do.
“It’s definitely a lot faster, bigger guys up there. I’m not going to be throwing people around as I could in junior,” said the 6-foot-1, 195 pounder. “They’re going to have better sticks when I’m playing on the defensive end there so it’s definitely going to test my skills.”
Going into the draft the Timbermen felt they needed to be stronger with their transition corps and Brebber fits the bill, adept at playing both ends of the floor. He was a goal-a-game player in his last two seasons of junior, but probably won’t be a go-to guy on offence with the T-men.
“The offence is pretty set on the right side with [Scott] Ranger and [Cory] Conway,” said Brebber. “It would be good to get up there once in awhile in transition.”
He looks forward to having those sort of stars as mentors, and he also likes the idea of being reunited with some former teammates. Brebber played most of his junior in Nanaimo, but got traded midway through last season to the Victoria Shamrocks. At the time of the trade he mentioned that he envisioned himself being back in T-men colours one day.
Watching the draft from Kentucky, where he plays field lacrosse at Bellarmine University, Brebber was happy to see the Timbermen choose a handful of other Nanaimo guys.
“It will be good to see how we all do in training camp and see where we all end up on the depth chart,” he said.
The Timbermen’s most highly touted rookie will have a chance to be high on that list when the season begins in May.
“As a rookie you don’t expect too much, but I hope to make an impact wherever I can,” he said. “Wherever they put me I’ll give it 100 per cent.”
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