Six university women’s basketball teams coming to YK in October

In a first for the Northwest Territories, six universities will send their women’s basketball teams to Yellowknife for a preseason tournament in October 2026.

The North of 60 Classic will feature teams from the University of Victoria, University of Lethbridge, University of Toronto, Lakehead University, Wilfrid Laurier University and Mount Saint Vincent University.

Four Yellowknifers are expected to be on those teams’ rosters.

“It will be such a great opportunity,” said Janet Enge, who grew up in Yellowknife and now plays for the University of Toronto, “not only to get our Northwest Territories athletes home and have a beautiful homecoming, but also to bring high level basketball culture up to the North.”

Enge told Cabin Radio she brought the idea to Basketball NWT director of player development Aaron Wells after wondering why no preseason tournament like this had ever happened in Yellowknife.

Wells and Enge are now working with Mike Tanton and Paige Crozon of Saskatchewan’s Living Skies Indigenous Basketball League alongside Tina Locke-Setter to make the event happen this fall. Air North will be the title sponsor.

“We’ve always talked about this,” Wells said of the opportunity to bring U Sports women’s basketball to the NWT. Until now, he said, “we’ve never had the manpower to deliver it.”

Last week, Basketball NWT gave Wells and his fellow organizers a formal green light to go ahead. They’ll now start trying to raise tens of thousands of dollars in local sponsorship to cover costs.

“Four Yellowknife athletes are playing on those schools, so people will get to watch them, cheer them on. But then those schools are also going to be giving back to the community, working with the schools directly over the course of the five days,” said Wells.

“The nice thing about it being Thanksgiving weekend is there’s no school on the Monday, so they’re going to work with the local female clubs, the GOBall program and the Eagles program here on that Monday, doing some player development.”

‘It’s possible’

GOBall stands for Girls Only Basketball, a Yellowknife youth basketball program for girls. From there, young players can progress into the Eagles club basketball program.

Enge is a graduate of both, going on to play basketball for Wilfrid Laurier University before joining the University of Toronto.

“Because it’s the first time something like this has happened, it’s uncharted territory, the homecoming and the excitement that’s connected to it,” she said.

“When I was a little girl – when I first started playing basketball in the GOBall program – I dreamed big of playing on a university team.

“To go back to my roots and back to the gym that actually gave me my passion, and play on those courts again with a completely different mindset? I know my level of excitement is through the roof.”

Wells, pointing to statistics that show a drop-off in girls’ interest in sports at roughly the age of 15, says the biggest thing for him is having successful athletes from the North come back and share their stories.

“You hear from a lot of boys and girls that want to play basketball at the next level. You hear from the coaches what it takes, and sometimes with athletes that doesn’t always register,” he said.

“For young female athletes to see themselves in someone – hear their story, what they had to do to make it to that level, what they had to sacrifice, and that it’s possible – is going to be massively impactful.”

He’s hoping the city will rally around this opening event so that, if it’s a success, the same thing can run every two to three years in future.

Enge believes young girls in the North seeing women play sports at this level could change lives.

“I think kids in the North often struggle with the distance. They don’t get the same ease of exposure to that high level of play. Why don’t we flip the script? Bring athletes up to the North,” she said.

She can remember being an 11-year-old playing alongside 19-year-olds as she graduated through the ranks of programs in Yellowknife. That act of being “just thrown in” helped her as she reached university level, and now she’s excited to share her experience.

“Every time I took that next step, I always knew the only reason I was able to make these teams was because of the base I had in Yellowknife and the coaches I had around me,” said Enge.

“I knew what it was like to be a younger player stepping up to the next level, a little less developed. I was like, ‘Well, I’ve been doing this since I was 11,’ so there was no task I couldn’t overcome.”

The full North of 60 Classic program is scheduled to run from October 7-12. Organizers say that will involve clinics, school visits and nine U Sports games over four days.