News:
Chiek, the transient tower of power,
settles down on SAIT hardcourt
CALGARY — If this were the old Emmanuel Chiek, he would have looked back on the past half-dozen years as a series of false starts. But the new Emmanuel Chiek doesn’t look at life as a competition — except, of course, on the basketball court.
“I need myself an education, and for me, SAIT is a great place for it, because there are so many different avenues I could go,” says Chiek, 25, the six-foot-eight post with the SAIT Trojans men’s basketball team. “Instead of just getting a theoretical education, I can actually get my hands on something — work at the same time as getting my education.
“It’s taken me a long time to figure that out, and here I am, so I’m going 100 per cent at it right now,” adds Chiek, 25, who’s taking administrative information management classes at SAIT, with an eye to making a career in accounting or finance.
“I thought I would have maybe have figured it out by age 23, after my third school, but nah . . . not yet,” he says with a good-natured chuckle. “But everyone’s different. It could take a person two years, or it could take a person 10 years, to figure out exactly what they want, right?
“I was always told life is not a race. I’ve always thought of it as a race. And now I finally look back and go, ‘Wow. It definitely isn’t a race.’ ”
The native of Guelph, Ont., has built up quite a roundball itinerary since he won a Calgary city high school basketball championship with Lester B. Pearson, attending classes and playing hoops at the University of Saskatchewan (2003-04), SAIT (’04-05), and Mount Royal University (’07-08). But he feels he’s found his niche during his second time around with the Trojans, who will host the 2010 Canadian Colleges Athletic Association men’s basketball nationals from March 18 to 20.
The Trojans (4-0) will square off against the Red Deer College Kings (4-0) in a two-game Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference set this weekend, starting Friday, Nov. 6 in Red Deer and finishing up Saturday, Nov. 7 at SAIT’s Campus Centre gym.
“It’s an amazing team, a very deep team. We all come from very different backgrounds, and we all know how to play the game,” says Chiek, who played one game with the long-defunct Calgary Drillers of the American Basketball Association in ’04-05. “I think the one thing we need to do right now is start getting used to each other, start figuring out how everybody plays. This weekend, now that we’re playing another good team, we can finally show our talent and our skill set.”
Chiek, in his fifth and final year of college eligibility, has started to shake the dust from his shoes after a year away from the court. Saturday at Caronport, Sask., in a 105-79 win over the Briercrest College Clippers, Chiek chalked up 25 points, five rebounds, four assists and six steals — a personal tour de force for the inside man who’d averaged 12.5 points during the first weekend of the season.
“I’ve been pleasantly surprised with Emmanuel. I think he’s still working some of the rust off, not having played in a year,” says third-year Trojans head coach Mike Stevens. “Versatility-wise, we’re trying to let him get out on the perimeter and shoot the ball a little more than he has in the past. That’s a skill people often don’t realize he has.”
Stevens played for the Trojans alongside Chiek and current SAIT co-captain Fabian Warner, who’s returned from a three-year hiatus, during that 2004-05 season. Stevens appreciated the lanky post as a teammate, and has even more appreciation for Chiek now that he’s taken over as coach.
“You can go out and pressure, because he’s always there to help make up for mistakes with his length and his athleticism. That gives you such peace of mind as a teammate,” says Stevens. “And Emmanuel is willing to take it all on: ‘Put it on me, and I’ll do my best to deliver.’ If his play isn’t up to par, it doesn’t take more than having a conversation with him, and he’ll turn it around.”
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