They are about five feet tall. They wear ponytails and headbands. None of them has a driver's license. And they win gold medals like they are being given away.

On Saturday afternoon, the Hidden Valley Huskies, defeated Whitehorse Elementary 36-30, winning gold for the second year in the grade seven basketball championships.

The Huskies story starts last year, when the girls, then mostly in grade five and six, decided it was time to take home the gold medal. A young team, training has been crucial to keeping up with the city's larger schools.

"Usually you can see a squad coming. But I couldn't see it. I told them, it's a training year this year, but they said ‘well, what do we have to do to win it?,” said Peter Harms, their coach. "Then they started; recesses, lunch hours, whenever there was a chance, they were playing ball.”

When last year's tournament rolled around, they won gold.

This year, the Huskies decided to take training to the next level, focusing on a controlled inside game.

"They would work on skills, do one hour of lay-ups straight. They were ripping lay-ups from one net to another, said Harms.

"Grade sixes and sevens don't take many outside shots, and because of that the whole game is in the key. We really worked on lay-ups, and running, getting there first and being deadly accurate, and these girls are.”

These days, kids spend about as much time online as they do on the court. Leading up to last weekend's tournament, the Huskies researched drills and plays online and brought them back to their coach, who was happy to run them through the new material.

"They would come to me and ask if we can run these ones, and we'd work on picks, crossovers, lay-ups, try to get rid of panic shooting and play a controlled game of basketball,” said Harms. "It brought them the gold.”

The efforts paid off. On the floor, the Huskies were able to execute the plays they had trained for and work as a team, anticipating each other's next move and setting each other up for the shot.

"It was so amazing to see ten year old kids running the court and training through hand signs and the team responding,” said Harms. "They're such a cool bunch of kids.”

They are also versatile. In addition to their victories on the basketball court, the Huskies are also volleyball champions, having also won gold in that sport for the last two years as well.

The Huskies are proud of themselves and they credit their run of victories to hard work and practice.

"We practiced really hard every day because we all really wanted gold,” said Line Jensen.

"I think doing lay-ups to music really helped us train,” said Thea Carey. "We would pass the ball, dribble, shoot, hit the ground and go back, in a minute.”

"All that training really helped,” said Yataya van Kampen.

They also credit much of their success to their coach, who with the help of assistant coach, Heather Boardman, was able to lead the girls to victory in both sports.

"He's a really good coach, I've never had one like him,” said Carey. "He's exciting, he says he can get you a medal, you just have to choose which one.”

"This was our hardest year competing,” said Kataya Ulrich. "Mr. Harms just helped us get better, quick.”

Mostly, they're just glad to be done another successful season.

"I feel pretty good,” said Jensen. "I like gold.”

The Huskies are: Jensen, Carey, Ulrich, van Kampen, Katie Gallagher, Indica Stewart, Rebecca Koser, Adrianna Smith and Emiko Teramura.