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Fraser Valley Cascades set to challenge CW’s best as top holdovers meld with blue-chip recruits

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ABBOTSFORD — Looking back in the rearview mirror, it’s safe to say that a pair of B.C.-based university men’s basketball programs experienced breakthrough seasons en route to inspired performances on the national stage at last month’s CIS Final 8 national championships staged in Vancouver.

Yet while the host UBC Thunderbirds and Kamloops’ Thompson Rivers WolfPack each acquitted themselves well against the rest of Canada’s best with the kind of young-and-returning talent that will insure their national relevancy again this coming season, they’ve got a local rival poised to join their ranks in 2016-17.

“We’ve had some talented teams in the past,” remarked Adam Friesen, head coach of Abbotsford’s Fraser Valley Cascades, “but next year we’ll have the deepest team we’ve ever had.”

That’s because a Cascades team which finished 12-8 this past season in the Canada West conference with an equally-youthful lineup, not only returns all but one player, but adds a six-player recruiting class which includes two seasoned transfers as well as four well-decorated B.C. high school seniors.

“We are going to be able to be more aggressive and play faster for longer periods of time,” said Friesen, whose team was able to sweep Thompson Rivers in a two-game home set to earn a regular-season split against a Pack team which beat UBC before losing to Calgary in the Canada West final, then gave eventual national champ Carleton a real push for three quarters in the first round of the Final 8.

“We want to play aggressive and fast, and we want lots of movement, on offence especially.”

Aware that no one player will fill the shoes of graduated guard Kevon Parchment, the Canada West’s Defensive Player of the Year, Friesen’s frontcourt strategy has been to bring in 6-foot-5 transfers Denver Sparks-Guest from Simon Fraser, and Andrew Morris from Victoria, and that pair will join a tough-minded veteran quartet which includes Nate Brown, Mark Johnson, rebounding specialist Navjot Bains and up-and-coming Matt Cooley.

Sparks-Guest, who will be playing for his third head coach in three seasons, is a versatile, athletic combo player who is adept at playing in a high-tempo offence.

Morris, who red-shirted one season at SFU, played two seasons at Capilano University then played sparingly last season with the Vikes, has his best opportunity to showcase a blend of skills that include three-point shooting and guarding multiple positions.

Joining the forward group will be a pair of 6-foot-5 wing-types in Daniel Adediran of Surrey’s Pacific Academy and Jordyn Sekhon of Abbotsford’s W.J. Mouat.

Adediran, who averaged 32.5 points and 16 rebounds per game at double-A provincial tournament, is a player whose ceiling is thought to be huge. Based on his physical attributes, he could emerge as an elite defender at the CIS level. Who could he potentially become?

“A Kevon Parchment type,” Friesen said. “I think we will see him impacting the game in a variety of ways. Defensively and as a rebounder, he has a chance to excel. The offensive game will just grow.”

Sekhon is also a real talent, a key cog on the Mouat team which advanced to the recent B.C. quad-A final four. He averaged 24.3 points and 7.3 rebounds at provincials.

The Cascades’ backcourt?

Veterans Manny Dulay and former Province Head of the Class honouree Vijay Dhillon are coming off breakthrough seasons, and Fraser Valley is fortifying its depth there with Riley Braich of Abbotsford’s Yale Secondary and Sagar Dulay, Manny’s brother, and a talented guard who helped lead Surrey’s Tamanawis Wildcats to second place at the B.C. quad-A championships.

Braich, who helped lead Yale to the 2015 B.C. quad-A title as an 11th grader, is a scoring machine. Over his Grade 11 season he scored 63 points in a single game, breaking the old school record of 61 held by Friesen, his new head coach. Braich also scored 51 points in a B.C. tournament game this past March against St. George’s, the fifth-highest in tourney history.

“His work ethic and the confidence he has in himself and his natural ability are unbelievable,” Friesen said when asked about Braich. “He just wants it. He puts in the work.”

The younger Dulay is also a major talent. He shot 41 per cent from three-point range this past season while averaging 16.5 points and 7.5 assists per game with Tamanawis.

“I think we were very competitive this past season and we have been that way last number of years,” said Friesen. “But we still have things to prove and we look forward to future. I think the fact that we were able to get a couple of wins against Thompson Rivers, who are an excellent team, lets us know that we are in the mix.”



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