Bronze was the medal colour of choice for B.C.’s provincial basketball teams at the under-17 and under-15 national championships earlier this month.
All four B.C. teams finished third in their respective tournaments, and each squad featured some Abbotsford content.
The U17 boys, featuring J.J. Pankratz of Yale Secondary and Abby Senior’s Devin Brar, edged Quebec 73-72 in the bronze medal game, with Pankratz scoring 16 points and draining a go-ahead three-pointer in the final minute.
Yale’s Jauquin Bennett-Boire was among the standouts at U15 nationals, earning first team all-star honours as B.C. clinched third place with a 65-51 win over Manitoba.
The U15 girls team, featuring Amanda Thompson of W.J. Mouat, Taylor Claggett of MEI, and Alicia and Cierra Roufosse of Yale, beat Ontario 58-57 for the bronze. Claggett had seven points and five rebounds in the third-place game.
Hailey Kendall played for the B.C. U17 girls this summer, and they went on to win national bronze thanks to a 69-38 blowout win over Quebec.
Basketball BC’s U16 teams participated in the Western Canadian Championships in Edmonton, and both the boys and girls teams went undefeated en route to gold. The B.C. U16 boys team included Yale’s Paul Baadsvik, Ashton Kendall and Jassi Gill, while fellow Lion Chantel Ewert played for the U16 girls.
