Nova Scotia puts on a show at the national basketball championships

The Carleton Ravens men's and women's basketball teams were the stars of the 2023 U Sports Final 8 weekend earlier this month when they became the first university in 38 years to claim both national basketball titles in the same year.

But every great story needs a fantastic setting, and the province of Nova Scotia delivered exactly that — building on a sterling tradition for the men's tournament in Halifax and cultivating a new one in Sydney, N.S., for the women's tournament.

Halifax being home to the men's national basketball championship is nothing new.

Thirty-four of the 60 men's national tournaments have been held in the province's capital, including 26 times at the Scotiabank Centre, the site of this year's event where fans were treated to an instant classic of a final.

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For the fourth time in the last seven years, Sports & Entertainment Atlantic (S|E|A), an event management company based in Halifax, organized the men's national championship in conjunction with U Sports and an Atlantic University Sport (AUS) school.

"We explored a lot of new ideas when it came to on-court activations, in-venue and out-of-venue hospitality, and ticketing to name a few," said Chris Jamieson, the tournament organizer and Director of Fan Services at S|E|A.

"We also took some risks with completely new ideas," he told CBC Sports. "This year, we launched two very successful community outreach plans that provided opportunities for minor basketball teams within our community to witness some Final 8 action. We had over 1,500 minor basketball youth in the building, which created a very special atmosphere."

Halifax, we truly are a sports city