Russel Early was a big part of the success had this season by Treherne Collegiate Institute's varsity boys basketball team.

His individual success along with the team's play placed him on the A/AA/AAA All-Manitoba first team, despite playing in 'A' tier - the lowest of the three tiers.

He gives his thoughts on this accomplishment.

"It was kind of exciting, seeing that I made it to the top of the players in A/AA/AAA," says Early. "My goal this year was more just to have fun with the team and stuff so this was unexpected."

Early says they didn't lose to any 'A' teams all season and they went on to win their zone championship. He adds their coaches helped push them to continuously get better throughout the year even when things were going well.

Early describes the way their season finished.

"We had our qualifying tournament and we did really well," Early explains. "We were ranked first going into provincials, in Fisher River, which was canceled due to the pandemic. It was kind of disappointing because we had a lot of potential this year and we had a really strong season going into it. We were hoping for a gold medal but we never made it there."

Unfortunately for Early, this was his final season of high school basketball as he will be graduating this year. He says this was probably the last time he will be playing organized basketball as he now plans to become an agriculture equipment technician.

He describes what the Treherne basketball program has taught him.

"I would say, hard work pays off in the end," says Early. "If you put all of your effort in, no matter if (the circumstances are) good or bad, if you put your effort in you'll get where you want to."

Early says basketball has taught him how to work with a team and he believes that will benefit him immensely in the future.