Jessica Hanson is one of those enviable athletes who comes by her talents and passions honestly. Recruited by universities on both sides of the border, the senior at Little Flower Academy has the nature and, having grown up courtside with one of Canada’s most successful basketball coaches, the 17-year-old has also been nurtured.
She is the daughter of two sports professionals — mother Theresa played basketball and is the director of athletics and recreation at the university of B.C. and father Kevin also played elite basketball, is now the head coach of the men’s UBC Thunderbirds and is one of the winningest coaches in Canadian college and university history.
Last week Hanson announced she too will be a Thunderbird and had accepted an offer from UBC women’s basketball head coach Deb Huband.
“At first, I really wanted to go away and kind of get out of Vancouver but when it came down to my decision, I realized I don’t want to leave what I have here. It’s special, the connections I have, and Vancouver is a great city,” Hanson said this week.
She is also being pursued by the UBC track and field team, which competes in the U.S.-based NAIA in a competitive season that doesn’t overlap with the winter basketball schedule. Hanson, a high jumper, competed at the 2013 Canada Summer Games and is one of Canada’s top 10 high jumpers for her age group.
Although her parents have a deep connection to UBC, the decision about Hanson’s future was entirely up to her.
“One hundred per cent,” said Kevin, who has coached his daughter since Grade 3 at Kerrisdale Annex and will see her through the playoffs one last time with the LFA Angels.
“I’m really happy she chose UBC. She had opportunities at several schools, there were five Div. 1 schools that had talked to her in the States. One, the University of Portland, was quite seriously looking at her. They signed another guard.”
In Canada, the University of Alberta and University of Saskatchewan, where national team coach DD leads the program, were also very interested.
“Education for her has been No. 1 for her the whole time so it’s very impressive that her grades have now shot up. She’s very focused that way,” said her father, who said he now appreciates what families experience when recruiters come knocking.
“As a parent, you really want the head coach to be talking to you, to get to know you because you’re trusting that coach, that person to be in charge of your kid’s life for five more years, basically,” he said.
Still, the decision was all hers.
“I did not know what she was going to do until she left the room, came back in and said, ‘I’m going to UBC,’” said Kevin.
Hanson was shooting hoops at UBC’s War Memorial Gym as soon as she could handle a ball. She was two years old when her dad moved from the Langara Falcons to the T-Birds, and in his office is a photo of her wearing the No. 6 jersey of Erica McGuinness, the all-time leading scorer at UBC, and the daughter of T-Birds assistant coach Shaun McGuinness.
“I’ve grown up in that gym, my earliest memories are watching there. Erica McGuinness, she was like my role model,” she said. “I think I’ll get that number next year.”
In the photo, the oversized jersey reaches Hanson’s feet. She hopes to wear it again now that it fits.
