VANCOUVER – It's playoff time at War Memorial Gym, with No.4-seed Thunderbirds men's basketball (15-5) beginning the Canada West winter playoff season at UBC with a quarter-final matchup at 2:00 p.m. (PT) on Friday.
The T-Birds' opponent will be decided in a neutral site play-in game at War Gym on Thursday, with the No.5-seed Manitoba Bisons (13-7) taking on the No.12-seed Brandon Bobcats (8-12) at 5:00 p.m. (PT).
UBC enters post-season play following a hard-fought split in Victoria over the weekend, defeating the defending national champions in their building 85-76 via dramatic fourth-quarter comeback on Friday, before losing a close 93-85 rematch on Saturday. This follows the 'Birds' win over the Vikes at War Gym in the fall, which snapped the Vancouver Island side's two-year long regular season win streak. This is the first time that UBC has won its season series against archrival Victoria since the 2018-19 campaign, which is quite a feather in the cap of first-year interim head coach
Phil Jalalpoor.
"Credit to the guys, they really came out and were super resilient on that Friday night, sold out crowd, and kind of adapted after the beginning of the game wasn't the best," reflected Jalalpoor.
"It was kind of the backup lineup that had the stretch that really turned it around. That's our approach, we believe in whoever we put on the court, and it was cool to see that high pace, high intensity maintained and I think we wore them down."
The T-Birds have been a force on both sides of the ball in their first season under Jalalpoor, with their ball movement-heavy offensive approach and range of creative defensive schemes leading to the second most points per game (86.6), lowest field goal percentage against (38.4), and best rebounding margin (+7.8) in Canada West.
"It's about being quick, creating an advantage early and maintaining that advantage throughout the possession," mused Jalalpoor. "Besides that, defensive variability, switching up what we do quite a bit, and then bringing that overall intensity.
"Those are the three keys for us I think: pace, defensive variability, and then being the hardest working team out there."
UBC now faces the unusual challenge of not knowing who its quarter-final opponent is until around 19 hours before tip-off of the quarter-final.
"We keep the same approach that we've had in trying to correct things from last week, always getting better, because if we do the things that we want to do well, it doesn't really matter who we play," said Jalalpoor.
"Then we prepare for both opponents equally, try to find patterns, figure out what is within our scope to focus on that will make the biggest difference against both teams, and emphasis those things as we prepare for Friday's game."
The Brandon Bobcats present an intriguing potential matchup for the blue and gold. Fourth in the conference in scoring and third in points against, the Bobcats, who have not come to War Gym for a regular season or playoff game since 2017, profile as a high entertainment value opponent.
This is especially so because of the presence of Sultan Haider-Bhatti. The fifth-year guard/forward affectionately known as 'Batman' was a second-team All-Canadian last year and the first overall pick of the CEBL Draft. He's followed that up with an even better 2025-26 campaign, sitting second in Canada West in average scoring (20.1 PPG), rebounding (10.5 RPG) and assists (5.7 AST/G), which arguably positions him as the favourite for conference Player of the Year.
"Obviously that guy is really, really good, and always a tough matchup because he can play one through five," commented Jalalpoor.
"They can be a super dangerous team, if they hit their shots they're deadly. You can see that they've beaten almost everybody, including Manitoba. They play loose, you have to compete to hang with them, they're going to play hard for 40 minutes, and are willing to shoot everything."
Manitoba's statistical profile is less distinctive, as the Bisons appear to have a well-rounded and balanced team. One area where they particularly excel is in avoiding giving up second chance opportunities, as they allow the fewest offensive rebounds in Canada West.
Though they have several standout players, a Bison to watch is guard Mason Kraus. The fifth-year Winnipeg native is top-10 in conference scoring (15.7 PPG) and led Canada West in total assists this year (116), despite missing three games.
"I think that they're a better team than their record indicates," Jalalpoor concluded. "They have a core of fifth-year players in their last run together who have played all five seasons with Manitoba, mostly a bunch of local guys too, so they're going to play hard for each other and can be very dangerous.
"They do a bit of everything, shoot the ball, aggressively get to the paint, play with pace, bring intensity on defence. They're not the tallest team but they make up for, or take advantage of that even, with great switch defence. A truly veteran team, we saw them in the playoffs last year, and they've only lost one rotation player from that team and added to it with more talent."
Friday's quarter-final is do-or-die for the blue and gold, with their season, and the collegiate careers of all five of their regular starters, on the line. Should the T-Birds advance to the semis, a trip to No.1-seed Winnipeg (16-4) for another single elimination game would most likely be in store. If the 'Birds win and Winnipeg is upset in its quarter-final, UBC would then be in line to host a semifinal on Friday, February 20
th.
