TSN's Luke Bellus reports from the U SPORTS men's basketball tournament in Halifax, where the national quarterfinals were played Friday night.


Calgary 94 SMU 78 

The opening game of the tournament was on upset alert after the first half with the No. 7 SMU Huskies leading by five.

But the No. 2 Calgary Dinos showed why they went undefeated this year and outscored the Huskies by 21 points in the closing 20 minutes.

The 2018 U SPORTS champions took full control of the game when they outscored the Huskies 28-10 in the third quarter.

The separation created was too much for the Huskies to overcome and the Dinos punched their ticket to Saturday’s semifinal.

Mambi Diawara, who was recently named to the U SPORTS All-Canadian first team, finished the day with a triple-double of 17 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists. 

The Dinos win is their 26th in a row for them this year and 37th straight dating back to last season.


Ryerson 87 Concordia 47

A 14-0 run to start the game set the tone for the Ryerson Rams as they cruised past the No. 6 Concordia Stingers.

Ryerson built off that opening run and outscored the Stingers 26-6 in the opening 10 minutes. The Rams held Concordia to 3-for-19 shooting (0-for-13 from three) in the first frame while shooting 9-for-17 from the field themselves (5-for-7 from beyond the arc). 

The 20-point lead after 10 minutes proved to be too much for Concordia and the Stingers never got the Rams' lead below double digits.

Ryerson’s player of the game was fifth-year senior Myles Charvis, who had 14 points on efficient 5-for-8 shooting and added seven assists.

The fifth-year senior had the matchup of RSEQ MVP Ricardo Monge. Charvis and the Rams did a great job of limiting Monge’s output in the first half, holding him to two points on 1-for-6 shooting while also forcing him into three turnovers.

Monge finished with 11 points but did most of his damage while the game was well out of reach.

The Rams have now won their opening game in the last five U SPORTS (formally CIS) Final 8 Tournaments and are looking to get back to their third consecutive championship game.


Carleton 100 Alberta 60

The top-ranked Carleton Ravens came into the weekend on the heels of an OUA Championship and didn’t skip a beat, knocking out the No. 8 Alberta Golden Bears.

A big difference in the first half was the points off of turnovers; the Ravens were plus-9 halfway through the game and made the Golden Bears pay for costly mistakes.

Powered by their defence forcing 11 turnovers, and shooting 9-for-17 from beyond the arc, the Ravens had a 19-point lead at the half.

Eddie Ekiyor, a U SPORTS All-Canadian First team pick, led the Ravens in both scoring (13.9) and rebounding (6.2) this year. He topped his season averages in the first half as he led the charge for the Ravens.

Ekiyor's 19 points and 10 rebounds were both game highs and he reached those totals in just 24 minutes. Six of his double-digit rebounds came on offence, creating second chances for his teammates.

The Ravens have now been to 17 straight Final 8 weekends and have won a national championship in 13 of those appearances. Friday's win gives them 43 during this 17-year stretch, and they will look to add to their total as the weekend continues.


Dalhousie 74 UBC 65

Closing out Friday’s quarter-finals were the No. 5 Dalhousie Tigers, who used home-court advantage to beat the No. 4 UBC Thunderbirds.

The host team didn’t take the backdoor into the tournament and came into this weekend winners of the AUS for the fourth time in five years.

On the other side UBC took home the silver medal in the Canada West conference, earning them a spot at nationals for the first time since 2016.

After a sloppy first quarter the Tigers held UBC to just nine points and scored 15 of their own. The Tigers followed that up in the second by once again holding the Thunderbirds to nine points.

Dalhousie’s bench sparkled in the opening 20 minutes, outscoring UBC’s bench 10-0 and allowing the Tigers to create some separation in a low-scoring game.

The crowd came to life late in the third quarter when Tigers forward Sascha Kappos was on the receiving end of a lob pass and threw down an alley-oop.

The dunk from the 6-foot-10 third-year gave the Tigers a 12-point lead, and they took a double-digit margin into the final quarter.

The Tigers continued to roll until an 8-2 UBC run cut the lead to six, but that was as close as it would get and Dalhousie sent the crowd home happy.


The matchups for Saturday’s semi-finals are as follows:

No. 1 Carleton Ravens vs No. 5 Dalhousie Tigers 
No. 2 Calgary Dinos vs No. 3 Ryerson Rams

The winners meet for the U SPORTS title on Sunday.