Up against basketball teams from Ontario and B.C., some of which could feature future superstars such as the Phoenix Suns' Steve Nash and the University of Connecticut's Denham Brown, Yukon has always been in tough at the national championships.

To be honest, they need all the help they can get a fact that wasn't lost on Basketball Yukon President Tim Brady, who has been to enough national championships in the past to know what he's up against.

'Every province has a Centre of Performance for basketball,' explained Brady. 'Players are exposed to a very high level of training and great instructors at the university level. That pushes the competitive bar further and further away from the Yukon, because we don't have a centre like that.

'We've been left a little bit in the dust. We have to address that. The N.W.T. is in a similar situation and so is Nunavut, they're just starting out.'

As Brady looked toward the 2006 juvenile (under-17) boy's nationals, which will be held in August at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, B.C., he knew there needed to be some changes if the Yukon was going to continue attending. So he wrote two proposals and submitted them to Canada Basketball (CB).

One of those proposals asked for an age exemption that would allow the Yukon to take three overage players. That idea wasn't approved, as CB felt it would be a dangerous precedent. But the other proposal from Brady was accepted.

For the first time ever, Nunavut, N.W.T. and Yukon will combine their athletes to form one team which will compete at the juvenile nationals.

'I think they (CB) want us there,' said Brady, who is also the head coach of the combined team. 'They want to unify the country. If (the territories are) doing well, I think it's an indication of how we're doing nationally.

'This is a tremendous opportunity for all of the players from the North to come together to train and compete on a unified territorial team. The Yukon has a strong basketball tradition and we are excited to be able to bring together the top level players from the North and provide them with this opportunity.'

The first ever combined territorial team will be composed of two players from Nunavut, three from the N.W.T. and seven from the Yukon. They began the first of four, one-week training camps this week in Whitehorse.

'We were archrivals and now we're teammates,' grinned David Hall, a 16-year-old player from Haines Junction and the only member of the team from a Yukon community other than Whitehorse.

'This will bring up the talent level, it makes it more competitive.'

Hall and his parents have been commuting from Haines Junction on a daily basis so he can attend the training camp and compete at nationals.

Sam Carter, 17, came all the way from Iqaluit and is being billeted for the five weeks leading up nationals by assistant coach Al Beaver, whose son Tim also plays on the squad. Carter agreed with Hall that the combined team is a great idea for the North, especially considering Nunavut doesn't have a team of it's own.

'Not only do the players who go (to nationals) get better, but they can take it back to their communities as well. That way people at home can see you can go somewhere.'

Basketball, Carter admitted, is not too popular in Iqaluit. There is a high school team which travels to other communities in Nunavut for regional tournaments, and he and a few other players and coaches have been working with youth in the community to try and get the sport off the ground. But it's been nice for him to come to Whitehorse and work with players who are as serious about the game as he is.

'For a lot of these guys, just doing this, having the opportunity to train in sessions like this, is going to really help them,' Brady pointed out. 'This has cost some of these kids a fair bit of money, so I want to make sure I give them a great experience.

'For some of them, what they're going to remember is being here for a month, meeting new people, working hard and elevating their own play and experiencing a national tournament. To me, that's a great thing.'

While combining the territories will certainly make a stronger team for nationals, Brady is still careful not to get overly optimistic. He knows that realistically, the Yukon is not going to shock anybody and win a few games.

'At the end of the day, our goal is they maintain a very high competitive spirit and effort throughout the event, and have some fun with this too,' said the coach, who has taken Yukon to five juvenile championships in the past. 'I have a pretty good sense of what they're getting into.

'It's about accepting the fact you can only do what you can do. We will play to be in ball games, that's for sure. And who knows, if we can outscore a team in a quarter, hey, that's great.'

In training, the focus has been on attitude and effort. So far, Brady feels pretty good about the team's approach to working hard. He just hopes that continues through the four-week camp.

'I have a great assistant coach with (Jamie) Shaw, good supportive parents, some good billets, and by and large, some pretty good kids too.'

Half of the team is made up of 16-year-olds, who will be eligible to return to juvenile nationals next year, while the rest are 17 and in their final year of eligibility. For those older players, this may be their big chance to expose themselves to college and university scouts.

'I went to the Nike camp last summer and I visited Carleton (University) as well,' said Carter, who hopes to play CIS (Canadian Interuniversity Sport) ball when he graduates in 2007. 'I met the head coach at Carleton and I'm going to send him some video, so we'll see what happens.

'(Nationals) will probably be one of my biggest chances to get my foot in the door. I want to make sure I put everything on the line.'

Outside of the training sessions, the territorial squad is hoping to play games against a men's team from Whitehorse every Saturday and Sunday, and perhaps organize a summer tournament as well.

The juvenile boy's national championships will run for five days, August 1-5, and feature the top under-17 teams from each of Canada's provinces.

The territorial men's roster is as follows:

Guards

Tony Nguyen, Whitehorse, Yukon

Emmanuel Ramos, Yellowknife, N.W.T.

Sina Kazemi, Whitehorse, Yukon

Kai Nielsen, Whitehorse, Yukon

Tyler Wells, Yellowknife, N.W.T.

David Hall, Haines Junction, Yukon

Forwards

Robin Cunningham, Whitehorse, Yukon

Sean Charbonneau, Whitehorse, Yukon

Quincy Thomas, Yellowknife, N.W.T.

Peter Ohokanoak, Cambridge Bay, Nunavut

Tim Beaver, Whitehorse, Yukon

Post

Sam Carter, Iqaluit, Nunavut

Coach

Tim Brady, Whitehorse, Yukon

Asst. Coaches

James Shaw, Whitehorse, Yukon

Al Beaver, Whitehorse, Yukon