Eagles soar to provincial three-peat

By Lethbridge Herald on March 25, 2025.

SUbMITTED PHOTO The Immanuel Christian Eagles varsity girls basketball team captured the programÕs third straight provincial banner over the weekend.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

The Immanuel Christian Eagles varsity girls basketball team conquered the three-peat as Alberta Schools’  Athletic Association 2A provincial champions this past weekend at Rundle College in Calgary.

The No.2 ranked Eagles cruised to victory in the provincial final after knocking off the No.1 seeded Calgary Christian 59-29.

Immanuel Christian also defeated Taber Christian 61-42 in the semi-final and picked up a  45 -36 win over Lamont in the quarterfinals on route to the final.

“It’s pretty surreal,”  said Mike Greeno, Eagles head coach.

“Coming off of last year, we lost some pretty key pieces that were big contributors on that provincial title team. And so coming into this season we had a lot of empty roles that needed to be filled in order for us to be successful. And just seeing how far our team came from when we started in late November to where we finished off this weekend is just incredible to see.”

Sticking with a simple game plan was how the Eagles found success all weekend long.

“Just play great defence, rebound the basketball, limit the turnovers, and just in general be a great teammate,” said Greeno.

Greeno coached in all three provincial championship wins.

“All three of them are special in their own way,” said Greeno.

“Our first one was the first one for that group and the first one for our school community in a while.”

The Eagles hosted last year.

 “To be able to win it in front of everyone and to have that outpouring of support was super, super cool,” said Greeno.

Greeno said to win three times in a row is pretty rare.

“To see just how much growth had happened this season made this one special as well, “said Greeno.

The team felt uncertainty in terms of whether or not will team make it to provincials and how far in they would go after experiencing an increased amount of bumps in the road this year.

“But at the end of the day, we always just kind of said our season will not be a success based on the outcome of it. Our season will be a success based on how much growth we experience as people and as athletes throughout the year,” said Greeno.

The two Grade 12s of Hayden Van’t Land and Yar Biar have been a part of all three provincial titles.