Two-time Basketball Yukon’s player of the year, Jordan Brown is returning to the territory. And he’s not coming back empty-handed.
The former Vanier Crusader wants to give Yukon basketball players a boost by bringing with him the Passion Sports Basketball Academy, to be held May 29 through June 3.
“We’ve created a basketball academy on Vancouver Island for the last year and a half, through eight different cities, and are now expanding to the mainland,” said Brown. “We’ve had a fantastic response on Vancouver Island. We’ve mentored hundreds and hundreds of youths.
“It’s exciting to bring something like this to Whitehorse.”
Coming with him will be other players with experience playing in the highest level of Canadian basketball. Greg Wallis, who captained the men’s team out of Simon Fraser University and was twice named to the Canada West division all-star team as well as Basketball BC’s 2008 player of the year, will also be running the academy.
“He’s one of the top five players in western Canada,” said Brown.
Another player is Cyril Indome, who is currently the captain of the University of Victoria Vikes men’s team.
Together, the three have more than 15 years of coaching experience.
“Our programs are geared towards skill development, and we look to provide mentorship,” said Brown. “All of our coaches are people who’ve played college and university. So they’re passing down their personal knowledge of what it takes to get the next level.”
The academy is offering camps for three age groups, 7-10 and 11-13 from May 29 to 31. Since confirming the camp with Sport Yukon, the coaches have decided to extend the camp to those 14 and up, between June 1 and 3.
“We try to blend teaching drills, competitions and games,” said Brown. “And we talk about the mental aspect of the game, how to be mentally sharp.
“We talk about goal setting as well, something we feel is really important, to be able to set tangible goals and be able to work towards them. We do that in the camp and then send home with goal-setting sheets for their own season.
“We provide on-court and off-court mentorship.”
Interested? You can register at Sport Yukon or e-mail Brown at pssion.sports@live.ca.
“(Passion Sports) stands for having dedication and motivation to work harder,” said Brown. “We realize those elements are what it takes to do something significant with the game, to get to the next level.”
Contact Tom Patrick at
tomp@yukon-news.com