In the Canadian Elite Basketball League, the only certainty is uncertainty.
As the playoffs begin Thursday, that has never rung truer.
In the Eastern Conference, a meaningless regular-season finale between the top-seeded Scarborough Shooting Stars and No. 2 Brampton Honey Badgers took a shocking turn thanks to a brawl to end the first half that now carries major playoff ramifications.
The Shooting Stars suffered a major blow as Canadian big man Frank Mitchell and second-leading scorer Javan Johnson were each handed one-game suspensions while another bucket-getter in Terquavion Smith was slapped with a two-game ban for their roles in the fracas. The Honey Badgers lost big man Tegra Izay for one game and late-season addition Roddy Peters Jr. for two.
Out west, the second-seeded Winnipeg Sea Bears saw key forward Emmanuel Akot leave the team for “overseas opportunities” and announced Tuesday that MVP frontrunner Teddy Allen would miss the opening round after sustaining injuries in an alleged nightclub assault.
Nightclub security assaulted, badly injured star Sea Bears player Teddy Allen, team says
The top-seeded Vancouver Bandits are playing for interim coach Rans Brempong after longtime bench boss Kyle Julius departed mid-season in the wake of a three-game suspension for a fan altercation.
And, in these playoffs, it’s win-or-go-home for everyone. No byes. The only margin for error exists in the Finals, which will be contested as a best-of-three — in the competing teams’ markets — for the first time in league history.
The Bandits will face the No. 4 Stingers in the first round while the Sea Bears take on the No. 3 Saskatoon Mamba. In the East, the Shooting Stars meet the No. 4 Niagara River Lions and the Honey Badgers welcome the No. 3 Ottawa BlackJacks.
The winners of each game, available to watch live on CBC Gem, CBCSports.ca and YouTube, will meet in the one-game conference finals.
Here’s a key storyline for each:
Scarborough hasn’t had anything to play for in weeks, having clinched the top seed in the East in early July. Yet it just kept winning, including five straight to close the season against desperate opponents.
The Shooting Stars’ 20 wins set a CEBL record, and Powell is a likely MVP candidate after finishing third with 22.9 points per game while placing first with a whopping nine target-score winners. This team should have been the prohibitive title favourite.
Instead, implications of that season-ending brawl suddenly loom over veteran coach Tyrell Vernon’s squad. It won’t have Powell’s pick-and-roll partner Mitchell, who ended the season as the only player to average double-digit boards at 10.5, and it will have to find a way to replace the 34 points per game provided by Smith and Johnson.
Wild on-court brawl erupts in Shooting Stars-Honey Badgers game
To make matters tougher, Scarborough’s first-round opponent just so happens to be the two-time defending champion River Lions, who found themselves in the same spot as the Shooting Stars last season, atop the East with plenty of time to spare. They went the complete opposite direction and lost five straight but rebounded to win the title with a similar group that returned this season.
Khalil Ahmad, the most clutch player in league history, has endured a bit of a down year, especially from beyond the arc, and his three game-winners are half as many as his previous low.
The teams met in the conference final last year, with the River Lions eking out a two-point victory after a game-winning three from Ahmad. Now, the window is open for Niagara to serve up even more Scarborough heartbreak.
Not exactly the question you want to be asking on the eve of the playoffs, but consider: Brampton started the season 7-1 only to then lose seven of eight. It went 3-5 over the final third of the season.
Luckily for Brampton, the impact of the brawl won’t be felt as much in the losses of Peters Jr. and Izay. Instead, the Honey Badgers are staring down bigger questions.
While Sean East II has paced the team with 22.8 points and 6.8 assists per game, doing everything expected as a marquee free-agent signing, fellow Stingers import Keon Ambrose-Hylton hasn’t made quite the same impact.
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Brampton’s barometer may very well be Cameron Tyson, who set the league on fire by making a whopping 60 triples in his first 11 games. In 10 appearances since, he’s made just 20. In that game against Scarborough, Tyson had a clear goal of getting back on track; instead he hoisted 14 three-point attempts and made just two. Woof.
It’s not like the BlackJacks are some walkover either, ending the season with just one less win than Brampton and carrying star power in the form of guard Javonte Smart, who may carry some extra energy after missing the playoff last year.
Entering the season, the hype around the Sea Bears was huge: not only did they bring back former MVP Teddy Allen, but they also signed three-time MVP Xavier Moon. In the end, they played just five games together as Moon’s debut was delayed, and the Sea Bears won just two of those contests.
Now, Allen is out, and suddenly it’s Moon’s team. To date, his return has been seamless — he had 14 assists in his debut as Allen went off for a league-record 53 points, and he scored a season-high 29 in a win over the BlackJacks.
Sea Bears star Teddy Allen injured in downtown assault
Akot, shooting 40.3 per cent from beyond the arc, is another significant loss, and suddenly the Sea Bears’ off-season overhaul, including new head coach Mike Raimbault, is facing a massive test.
Moon will line up opposite Mamba star guard Tavian Dunn-Martin, who scored at least 27 points in three of his last four games as Saskatoon fought to reach the playoffs. He was one of two players to make 80 three-pointers and finished third in assists per game.
All season, it seemed as though Winnipeg-Vancouver was destined to be the West final. Now, that’s in flux.
Vancouver’s playoff journey ended in heartbreak last season as a series of controversial calls led to its demise in the conference semifinals against the Calgary Surge.
The Bandits returned this season with a vengeance, only to see Julius make a surprising exit. The other key figure from last season’s squad, MVP Mitch Creek, played just three games.
Vancouver Bandits clinch No. 1 seed in West with rout of Winnipeg Sea Bears
Still, the big Aussie might be the ace-in-the-hole. His third game was a 24-point rout of Winnipeg on Sunday to clinch the conference, and he’s scored at least 26 points in all of his contests, hitting the game-winner twice. Along with Montreal native Tyrese Samuel, the Bandits present a fearsome frontcourt.
It’s not the first time Vancouver has come into the playoffs as a West favourite, but it has never been able to get over the hump. Now, the path has perhaps never been clearer.
They’ll take on coach Jordan Baker’s veteran Stingers, who limped to the finish line and nearly got overtaken by provincial rival Calgary.
Jevohn Shepherd’s 2026 CEBL Champion predictions
