INUVIK
Fifteen teams and 128 players competed last weekend at Inuvik's annual 5v5 basketball tournament.

The Monstars came in as the runner-up team to Fort McPherson. From left to right are Phil Alexie, Kyle Lachnit, Clinton Gordon, Chris Church, Robert Charlie, Jozef Semmler, Liam Larocque and Trevor Charlie. - photo courtesy of Lorne Guy

"It was very good," said Kolbi Bernhardt, a Grade 12 student at East Three Secondary School and member of the senior girls' team.

Her squad didn't win her division, but she was proud of how her team played.

"We had pretty competitive games against all the teams we played," she said. "We didn't quite win as much as we wanted to, but we did have fun as a team."

Offensive play and co-operation were her team's strengths, she said, but they need to work on their defense in the future.

Bernhardt's been playing basketball since age 12 and says she's noticed development in her game each year.

Younger players making up the Rainmakers and the Wonder Pets kicked off the weekend with a sizeable cheering squad of peers from the elementary school.

The Pool 2 division featured two adult women's teams and two school teams. The Hoopsters went undefeated in the round robin and beat Swish Team 36-34 in the final. Their team was made up of Lain Voudrach, Donovan Arey, Sam Skinner, Michael Ha, Parker Burns, Keegan Greenland and Keiron Clement.

The largest pool, adult men's and senior boys, saw Tuk U go undefeated in round robin play, only to be upset by the Monstars from Inuvik 40-29. The East Three Secondary School Senior Boys team also ran the round robin before being upset by Fort McPherson in the semifinals.

In the championship game, Fort McPherson narrowly edged the Monstars 40-37.

The Fort McPherson team was made up of Les Blake, Doug Keevik, Ryan Faurchner, Ian Snowshoe, Stan Snowshoe, Sebastien Herbert-Andrews, Dean Charlie and Wade Karkagie.

A highlight of the tournament for organizer Lorne Guy was the strong female representation.

Natasha Kulikowski, on the all-women team Huff and Puff, was also pleased with her team's performance.

"I think our division was suited to our skills, and hopefully we gave the school teams some good practice heading in to Cagers in Yellowknife," she said.

"I think the tournament went better than we expected. For eight of us who hadn't played together we did pretty well, finishing 2-2 after the round robin. Personally I hadn't played since school try-outs in about 1997, so it was definitely a new experience for me, and I had a lot of fun."

She was surprised to hear the female representation at this tournament was higher than usual.

"The involvement of women in sport in the Delta seems to come in waves and right now is gaining momentum," said Kulikowski.

That can be seen in slo-pitch, where the women's territorials have been held in Inuvik for the last four summers, and in the co-ed teams recruiting more and more female members on their rosters.

"Volleyball is a great example of where women are dominating a sport," said Kulikowski, pointing to the eight women's teams at the volleyball tournament just two weekends ago.

She said there is local female representation in many sports, from hockey to curling, skating, running, canoeing and more.

"The barriers that we face are the same as anywhere else, but with our smaller population if a person wants to try a sport that is dominated by one sex, they simply go and try it, or in some cases, start their own group with like-minded people and they learn together," said Kulikowski.

She gave a shout-out to Guy for organizing the basketball tournament.

Guy thanked sponsors MACA, the Beaufort Delta Education Council, Sport North and Basketball NWT for their support.

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