Shai Gilgeous-Alexander comes home and thrills Hamilton crowd in Canadian senior basketball team debut
HAMILTON-My city. My game.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the local kid getting to play basketball in his hometown for the first time in about six years, put on some kind of performance here Friday night in his Canadian senior team debut.
The 23-year-old Oklahoma City Thunder guard had a dunk on the very first possession and took over completely in the third quarter as Canada beat Dominican Republic 95-75 in a World Cup qualification game.
His 15-point third quarter was a gem. One sequence in particular - emphatic blocked shot, jump shot, charge taken - electrified the crowd and will be a lasting memory for many who got to see him play in person for the first time.
He did not disappoint. Gilgeous-Alexander finished with 32 points, 20 in the second half, along with five assists and five rebounds.
It was so fun, just seeing all the people that saw me grow when I was in high school were there to see me play today," he said. Something I can't describe. It was super fun. I knew this day was coming, and it went just how I wanted it to."
How his teammates wanted, as well.
It's a privilege to play with a guard like that," 31-year-old Kelly Olynyk said. Fun to witness, and I think everybody here got a treat."
All in all, it was a splendid night for Canada Basketball and a senior men's team that hadn't played in southern Ontario since the Canada Day weekend in 2018.
The game drew a crowd of more than 6,000, which doesn't sound like a ton except that the beloved Hamilton Tiger-Cats were playing a home game a few kilometres away at Tim Hortons Field, and Canada Basketball is not traditionally a huge draw.
In 2018 at Ricoh Coliseum in Toronto, the senior men drew a smaller audience than showed up here Friday night for a similar World Cup qualifying game against the Dominican Republic.
And since the senior men play so seldom in Canada with anything of substance at stake, it could very well have been their biggest crowd in Ontario dating back to the 1994 World Cup, split between Toronto and Hamilton. Complete boxscores with official attendance aren't readily available, but those who have seen almost every game in that span couldn't recall as big a crowd.
The Canadians gave them an impressive show, especially after a sluggish start attributable to only a four-day training camp for this game and Monday's in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
A sloppy start - five first-quarter turnovers, 2-for-10 shooting as a team from inside the three-point line - gave way to dominance sparked by the NBAers on the roster.
Gilgeous-Alexander, cousin Nickeil Alexander-Walker of the Utah Jazz, Detroit's Olynyk and Dwight Powell of the Dallas Mavericks were simply too good for the competition.
It was a sign of the true depth of a Canadian team that didn't have R.J. Barrett, Jamal Murray, Lu Dort, Oshae Brissett, Khem Birch or Cory Joseph, all of whom have committed to the program through the 2024 Paris Olympics.
It's fun to get back out here, especially in front of fans on home soil," said Olynyk, who made his senior team debut in 2010. You don't get that opportunity every day. To just do that is fun.
This group of guys, young guys especially, I feel like I'm the oldest guy out here now. It's just fun to get up and down with them. They've got a lot of talent, a lot of skill, and it's fun to be out there."
Canada is 5-0 in this portion of the qualification process and has already guaranteed a spot in the next phase.
The men wrap up this stage of qualifying on Monday, and their next game will be in late August against Venezuela or Argentina.
When the convoluted process is finally over in February 2023, seven teams from FIBA Americas will qualify for next year's World Cup in Indonesia, Japan and the Philippines.
Doug Smith is a sports reporter based in Toronto. Follow him on Twitter: @smithraps