CALGARY – The start of a new era for the University of Calgary Dinos women's basketball program begins this weekend with the 2025-26 Canada West season opener.

First-year head coach Sarah Besselink leads the Dinos down to Lethbridge to take on the Pronghorns for the first two games of the year.

Besselink comes to Calgary after a long run of success at the University of Ottawa. She was a standout on the court for the Gee-Gees, earning OUA (Ontario University Athletics) honours three times before graduating as the fourth-leading scorer in program history. She quickly transitioned from player to coach, and spent five years on the bench with her alma mater – including four as the lead assistant.

"It's been a really smooth transition," Besselink said of coming to Calgary. "Driving 35 hours across the country with my husband and my dog was an adventure, but once we got here, everything has been awesome. Everyone has been welcoming and great as we adjusted to being a two-hour time difference from our families."

While there is change at the top for this year's Dinos team, there is quite a bit of consistency on the court.

Calgary returns three of its five starters from a team that went 16-4 in conference play a season ago. While the top two scorers from that group have moved on (including Mya Proctor, who is now playing professionally in London), this year's squad still returns over 50 percent of its scoring and over 70 percent of its rebounding.

"Obviously, they were competitive team to begin with," Besselink said. "Coming in, I wanted to meet with the seniors and the veterans on the team and talk about what are some of the things they like and some of the things they know how to do and how can I incorporate that, and merge the two styles of play and where I can see we can have some growth."

Among that veteran core are three fifth years in Amélie Collin, Sydney Milum and Pollyanna Storie who have combined for 218 games played and 131 starts between them. 

Behind them are four fourth years Milica Gajic, Kourtney Oss, Elana Sireni and Lilia Skumatova who all bring extensive experience.

"We have three different types of leaders is how I see it," Besselink said. "Polly is incredibly intelligent. She has a very high IQ and she really helps out the rookies and everyone who is playing with her in terms of defensive rotations or offensive reads. She's fantastic in that sense. Syd is our communications piece. She brings the energy. She motivates. She remains positive the whole time. And she really anchors our defence in that way. People really look up to her and she helps us with that aspect. And Amelie is just a workhorse on both ends of the floor. Sometimes she can be a vocal leader, but other times it's just leading by example with her aggressive defence and turning that into offence. 

"So those three are definitely a strong leadership core. Our fourth years following in their footsteps and filling in the gaps definitely makes us a veteran team."

Joining that veteran core are four newcomers to this year's roster. Saavyn Kaur Mann (a 5-foot-7 guard from Surrey, B.C.), Mackenzie Henderson (a 5-foot-6 guard from Kelowna, B.C.) and Neelum Sidhu (a 6-foot-1 forward from Delta, B.C.) all come to Calgary for their first university experience. 

Meanwhile, Raya Hafez returns to her hometown after two years at the University of Toronto. The 5-foot-7 guard provided an instant impact with the Varsity Blues, making 35 starts in 37 total games and leading the team in scoring with 11.4 points per game last season. 

"We recruited her (Hafez) at Ottawa and then played against her at UofT the last two years. When she reached out saying she had talked to (last year's interim head coach) Jhonnny (Verone) before, it was great because I was already super familiar with her. She was great for UofT I was super excited about her. She has really grown so much because of the playing time she got at Toronto."

So far, that veteran leadership and new youth have mixed together incredibly well in preseason play. The Dinos finished a perfect 6-0 leading into this year's conference slate, including a dominant stretch against StFX, Western and UFV – teams that combined to go 39-23 a season ago – by an average final score of 79-50.

"In preseason, we really commit to our defensive principles. It was fantastic to watch as a coach," Besselink said. "We consistently held teams under 40 of 50 points. Holding U SPORTS teams under that mark is incredible. And it's kudos to this team for buying in on the defensive end. 

"We've been able to score more in transition than in years past. Having only worked on it for roughly two months, that's a huge positive. And we'll continue to just work on that flow from pushing that pace. We've been working a lot on offensive flow and, so far, it's been good."

"I'm very excited to get the conference season going. I'm still learning all about Canada West and seeing a number of these gyms and cities for the first time. But I'm very fortunate to have this group be my first group as a head coach. As we've talked about, they're veteran and they've been very welcoming. Overall, I'm just excited to be here and get things going."

The 2025-26 conference opener tips off Friday when the Dinos take on the Pronghorns from Lethbridge's from the Co-op Centre for Sport & Wellness. Calgary's first home game Nov. 14 when UFV comes to the Jack Simpson Gym.

-UC-