UCLU Men’s Basketball: Premiership success and Sportsnite regrets

UCLU Men’s Basketball have won 9 trophies over the past 3 years. The firsts are sitting comfortably in the top three of BUCS South Premiership after being promoted last season, and the seconds are top of their league.

1st Team Captain Marcin Konopa mentions that they lost in the BUCS championship last season as players either didn’t show up or were too hungover to play in their cup match. This awkwardly lives up to the 3 things they came up with to describe themselves: lazy, unorganised and mildly talented… let’s hope that they’re incredibly modest too.

UC Men play in baby blue (photo from @UCLUNetball)

Communications Officer Andy Carpenter reveals that a Basketball Varsity is planned for the end of this academic year, separate from the London Varsity Series, in which UC 1sts will take on Strand Poly 1sts. Last year the 1sts beat King’s by around 40, and the 2nds only lost by a narrow margin when they played them recently. A UC victory in the Basketball Varsity looks quite promising.

The club is also looking to make a 3rd team soon considering the turnout they received at trials this year. Andy comments that “trials are pretty hectic because we only get 1 court for around 100 people,” and Social Sec Conor Faulkner adds that they’re “quite competitive – 1sts especially [with] 3 or 4 guys who’ve all played on national teams.”

Marcin is eager to recruit anyone who’s tall and can play basketball. Apparently, UCLU Men’s Basketball is smallest team in the league. Their shortest player, Marius Mostert, stands at a minuscule 5’10, and the average height is a measly 6’4. This is quite hard to believe, since the tallest people roaming around Phineas or Loop are usually Basketballers. Perhaps they’ve already bagged all the tallest guys at UCL… are we just a really short uni?!

Basketballers apparently need the aid of fake ‘fros to appear taller.

Andy guarantees 3 things on a typical Wednesday night with UCLU Men’s Basketball: Will Hall staying at the Union drinking Guinness (perhaps the classiest sportsnite-goer in history?!), Jamie Stronge ending up at Loop despite claiming he won’t succumb to its strange allure, and obscene amounts of money being spent on jagerbombs.

Another familiar sight is Ian Cundall (an American – shame on you Brits!) and Dave Ellis downing the fastest pints. Apparently they have no gag reflex, a natural phenomenon I have yet to fathom. The mad rush from 8pm games to the showers (and the long wait for David Ellis to finish grooming himself) then the Union and then Loop usually results in black outs and Thursday morning regrets.

When they’re not scoring in BUCS and Loop, UCLU Men’s Basketball show some impeccable talent on the Netball court. Conor said it was an honour to win Interclub Netball, and mentions a potential full-game playoff against Netball 1sts to see who’s really the best UC Netballers.

Despite their sportsnite antics and alarming height disadvantage, UCLU Men’s Basketball continues to storm through their season. We look forward to a UC at Basketball Varsity and wish them luck against UCLU Netball 1s in their Netball Showdown!