Canadian men’s basketball squad earns CP Team of the Year Award
The national men’s basketball team has won the 2023 Canadian Press Team of the Year Award.
This announcement came 24 hours after Shai Gilgeous-Alexander received the Lionel Conacher Award as the 2023 Male Athlete of the Year.
READ: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander earns CP Male Athlete of the Year honour
Gilgeous-Alexander and his teammates helped Canada secure bronze at the FIBA World Cup last summer. During the competition, the Canadian team also qualified for the men’s Olympic tournament in Paris 2024, a first since the Sydney 2000 Games.
Led by head coach Jordi Fernandez, hired two months before the start of the World Cup, Canada began its tournament on a positive note by winning all three of its matches in the first preliminary round against France (95-65), Lebanon (128-73), and Latvia (101-75).
Despite losing their first match of the second preliminary round against Brazil (69-65), the Canadians qualified for the knockout round with a victory over the top-ranked team in the world, Spain (88-85).
In the quarterfinals, the national team prevailed against Slovenia (100-89) before conceding to Serbia (95-86) in the semi-final.
READ: Canada advances to World Cup quarterfinals, qualifies for Olympics with win over Spain
However, Canada bounced back in the bronze medal match, defeating its perennial rivals, the United States, in overtime by a score of 127-118, marking the first time they achieved such a victory.
At the conclusion of the tournament, Gilgeous-Alexander was named to the All-Star Team of the tournament, while Dillon Brooks received the title of Best Defensive Player.
This marked the first medal won by Canada in an international basketball competition since the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
READ: 5 takeaways from Team Canada’s historic performance at the FIBA Basketball World Cup