Reigning Canada West women’s basketball player of the year Carly Ahlstrom is full of motivation entering the 2023-24 season, even more so than in previous years.
Not only is the five-year veteran wanting to improve on her MVP-calibre season, she is looking to finish off her collegiate career on the right foot.
“It’s definitely bittersweet,” said Ahlstrom. “Sad to be in my fifth year, but it’s exciting nonetheless.”
Ahlstrom is back with the University of Saskatchewan Huskies as the team looks to avenge a stunning exit in last spring’s Canada West semi-finals, a shocking result for the program ending a streak of three consecutive conference championships and eight straight years of playing at the U Sports national championship tournament.
“Going into the off-season there was a lot of mixed emotions,” said Ahlstrom. “It took a while for sure to build up that will again. But we are fired up as per usual.”
In that semi-final tilt, the top-seeded Huskies struggled to get any offence going as they fell to the eventual national bronze-medal winning University of Alberta Pandas 69-57.
As a result, head coach Lisa Thomaidis said the team needed to improve a number of skills over the course of the off-season and is confident they have the pieces to get back to the Canada West final.
“We’ve won a number of Canada West championships,” said Thomaidis. “I think five out of six years leading into last season and it’s really, really hard to win a championship. We’ve been very fortunate and last year it was just one of the few times it didn’t go our way.
“I think it really lit a fire under a lot of us.”
Kicking off the 2023-24 Canada West season on Friday night in Alberta, the Huskies will be a part of a new playoff format this season which will include a centralized tournament at the University of the Fraser Valley.
While that means the Huskies will not host any playoff games this year, Thomaidis feels the veteran depth of the team should be even greater than last season.
Returning pieces for the top-ranked team in the pre-season coaches poll include Ahlstrom, guards Gage Grassick and Téa DeMong, as well as Canada West rookie of the year Logan Reider.
“We’re more than just a one-trick pony, so to speak,” said Thomaidis. “I think there’s a lot of players who can go off and score 20 points on any given night. That’s a fun place to be in.”
On the other side of the coin is the Huskies men’s basketball team, which endured its own kind of heartbreak over the 2022-23 season.
After starting the year with a 99-77 victory over the Mount Royal Cougars, the Huskies would go on to lose their next nine games in a row to finish the season well outside the playoff picture with a 5-15 record.
According to head coach Jamie Campbell, last season’s constant stream of injuries halted any chance at progress and stability for the team.
“We’d change the way we’d play, somebody else would get hurt,” said Campbell. “Change the way you’d play, somebody else get hurt. Eventually, you can’t keep changing the way you play.”
Saskatchewan’s fall to the bottom tier of the Canada West standings came just one year after reaching the U Sports national championship final, bringing a silver medal back to the Prairies.
That dichotomy resulted in a humbling season for the Huskies’ veteran players, however it’s an experience that has added perspective throughout the organization.
“When you’ve seen the highs and then you experienced the lows that we had last year, I think you know it’s where you don’t want to be,” said Campbell. “That really brings a great amount of work ethic and then a lot of knowledge that you can pass along to the new guys.”
Like their women’s team counterparts, the Huskies men’s roster features several returning veterans including Tyrese Potoma, Chan Di Ciman, Fisayo Moibi and Alexander Dewar.
Looking ahead to the schedule, Dewar is stressing the need for the ‘Dogs’ to get off to a strong start and avoid the same hole they dug themselves last fall.
“We got a tougher first half of the season,” said Dewar. “These first few weeks are going to be very meaningful, so hopefully they will be good tests. We have some great teams coming up who have great skill, great coaches. So it will be really awesome to see where we’re at compared to them.”
Following their season-opening road trips to Edmonton to battle the Golden Bears and Pandas, the Huskies men’s and women’s teams will hold their home openers on Nov. 10 against the MacEwan Griffins.
The following night on Nov. 11, the Huskies will honour their 2010 national champion men’s basketball team at halftime.
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