U of A's Adam Paige embodies 'culture of Golden Bears basketball' on and off the court

University of Alberta men's basketball star Adam Paige and his head coach Barnaby Craddock have different anecdotes for what they felt the Surrey, B.C., native's breakout moment was with the Golden Bears.

But both are in full agreement that it happened very early for the now 23-year-old that joined the U of A in the 2018-19 season.

"[In a game against Lethbridge] we had some injuries and had to play him at centre," said Craddock of the 6-foot-8 guard-forward hybrid. "And he became unguardable, because he could pick and pop and shoot the three.

"And at the same time, he could guard the other team's big guy. So they were having a hard time getting out on him on the perimeter, and he whacked in a bunch of threes, and we won somewhat easily. And we're like, 'Jeez, Adam's a pretty versatile guy.'"

Paige had a similar story about stepping up due to injuries, although at a completely different position when one of the all-time great Golden Bears, Brody Clarke, was dealing with an injury in the 2019 Canada West (CW) playoffs.

While Paige was able to step in then for Clarke, there was no question that the 6-foot-8 forward was the driving force of the team in Paige's first two seasons, graduating after the 2019-20 campaign as the Golden Bears' No. 4 all-time scorer and No. 2 all-time rebounder.

Paige was able to rack up plenty of minutes as the first option off the bench in his first two years, but was only able to secure eight starts over his first 58 games.

The departure of Clarke along with regular starting guards Ivan Ikomey and Dwan Williams left a void that Paige had a chance to fill coming into 2021-22 after the 2020-21 season was lost due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

On the court, Paige helped lead the Golden Bears to a