Matthew Mandziuk’s name makes regular appearances in the sports section of Yorkton This Week. The Yorkton Regional High School student athlete not only plays sports like basketball, football, soccer and track and field, but he also excels at them.
This summer, the Yorkton product is taking his basketball skills to a true national level as one of 12 players representing the province on the Saskatchewan’s U17 men’s team. The team will be competing at the Canada Summer Games in Winnipeg from late July into August. Mandziuk is the only player from Yorkton on the team.
The grade eleven student said making the elite team after a long tryout process felt awesome.
“After the final tryout, we did individual interviews. They give you a sheet of paper that says how many days in the making this team has been, and that you’ve been selected. It was pretty exciting to see,” said Mandziuk.
The team was selected in April, but tryouts started way back in November.
“At the first tryout in November, anybody was allowed to come. Then they cut it down to 40, then 24, then 18, and then they picked the final 12,” he said.
While Mandziuk has dipped a toe into national competition in the past, this summer will be his first true national tournament.
“I’ve played nationally the last two summers,” he said. “But this year is the first nationals where you all compete once. In the past, the tournaments have just had some provinces, and not all.”
After grade nine, he played on the Saskatchewan U15 developmental team. They played in a few tournaments mostly around western Canada. Last summer, he played on the U16 team. That team was chosen with this year’s Canada Games in mind, in hopes of developing those athletes into this year’s U17 team.
Because of those developmental teams, this year’s team members are pretty familiar with each other.
Mandziuk spends most of his time in the shooting guard position with Team Sask. But when he plays with the YRHS Raiders, he plays point guard.
Jason Payne is the basketball coach at YRHS. The two go far back, to when Mandziuk would hang around the gym at his older brother’s practices when he was about nine years old. Payne has coached him for the past few years, and had nothing but excellent things to say about his player.
“Matthew has a really high basketball IQ. He understands the game at a level that a lot of kids in our community don’t begin to understand,” said Payne. “He has the highest competitive drive I’ve seen in 15 years of coaching.”
Payne said talent, mixed with Mandziuk’s work ethic and refusal to lose anything, makes for a pretty special athlete.
When asked about his own strengths as a player, Mandziuk called himself a slasher.
“I like to drive to the basket, and make the tough baskets. And I like to play defense. I think defense is a good part of my game. I give in to the guy and make them work hard,” he said.
Payne said Mandziuk plays a solid all around game.
“As a point guard for us, he understands that part of his job is setting up teammates, and it’s also knowing when to score,” offered Payne. He said playing shooting guard for the Canada Games team will be beneficial to Mandziuk’s game, as it will allow him to see some perspective.
Payne said he’s proud of Mandziuk for growing into such a successful player, and it’s good to see the rural representatives in general on the provincial team.
“The last time we had a Yorkton kid on the Canada Games team, they won bronze. That was in 2005. It’s a good precedent that he’s got to help keep up,” said Payne.
Most of the players on the Canada Games team are from Regina, with a few from Saskatoon. There are only a few small city boys, and they come from Moose Jaw, Battleford, Pilot Butte and of course Yorkton.
With the Canada Games quickly approaching, the team has been practicing every weekend since May.
Mandziuk said Team Sask hopes to finish in the top four at the Canada Summer Games.
“In the last couple of years, [Team Sask] has done a lot better than we have before. Basketball in Saskatchewan is improving a lot, and I think we’ll do really good this year,” said Mandziuk.
The 2017 Canada Summer Games run from Friday, July 28 until Sunday, August 13. Their slogan for this year is ‘the hottest summer in half a century,’ because this year marks 50 years of the games. They’re held every two years, alternating between winter and summer games. The last summer games in 2013 were played in Sherbrooke, Quebec when the Ontario men’s basketball team took the gold.
