Greg DeVries (2010) - Sports Wall of Fame

Sports Wall of Fame

Greg DeVries

Class
Induction

2010
Sport(s)

Golden Bears Basketball

• Graduated as the Bears all-time leading scorer (2,740 points) and led the team in scoring four times
• Bears teams won one conference title, two CIS Championships, and one silver medal during his tenure
• Canada West First Team All-Star three-times, two-time CIS All-Canadian, and CIS tournament MVP
• Received the Wilson Challenge Trophy as the most outstanding male athlete at the U of A (1995)

“That young man is the finest natural shooter I have ever seen play the game of basketball!” This was an amazing tribute paid to Greg DeVries by a highly regarded B.C. basketball coach when he led Nelson’s L. V. Rogers Secondary High School to the BCAA Provincial Championship in 1991. As a result of his outstanding play Greg was named to the provincial All-Star Team. Enroute to that championship he established 11 provincial scoring records and a place of honour in his high school’s Hall of Fame.

Golden Bears Coach Don Horwood, on hearing of this tribute and already a friend of Greg’s father, persuaded this outstanding athlete to enroll at the University of Alberta. The rest, as is often said, is history. For the next five seasons (1991-1996) Greg wore the Green and Gold of the U of A and directed his teammates as point guard and the finest shooter on the floor. Over the course of his five seasons with the Golden Bears Greg became the teams’ all-time leading scorer, establishing an amazing tally of 2,740 points, which at the time was the most in Golden Bears history.

His outstanding shooting skills also won him the Walter Schlosser Award (as the team’s leading scorer) from 1993 to 1996.

Greg’s outstanding play produced two CIS national championship banners (1993-94 & 1994-95), one Canada West championship banner (1994), and a CIS slver medal in 1995-96 in what were truly “golden days” for the University of Alberta mens’ basketball program.

In recognition of this Sports Wall of Fame Inductee’s outstanding talents, Greg was named to both the Canada West First Team All-Star squad and the CIS National Championship all-star team multiple times between 1994 to 1996. His superb play during the 1995 CIS National Championship won Greg the recognition as the tournament’s Most Valuable Player, another “first” for a Golden Bears basketball player. Significant as these awards are they are not only awards of outstanding merit accorded to Greg DeVries.

For his outstanding leadership and team play throughout the 1994-’95 season Greg was named winner of the Arnold Henderson Memorial Award as well as the Wilson Challenge Trophy – the University of Alberta’s longstanding and most prestigious male athlete prize. Greg was hailed as “the best of our University’s best” – rare honours indeed. Equally outstanding is the fact that during the 1994-’95 and 1995-’96 seasons Greg won national recognition as an Academic All-Canadian.

While at the University, Greg met a young lady named Lisa, a player with the Panda basketball team. Following graduation Lisa and Greg were married and they have three young children – Tyus, Abigail and Keyan. Greg and Lisa moved to BC following graduation where Greg taught in high school programs there and coached basketball. Along the way he earned a commercial pilot’s license and, for a time, served as a “bush pilot” in northern B.C. He also studied the finer points of coaching in the heartland of US basketball – Indiana and Kentucky.

The University of Alberta Golden Bears basketball program seldom shone more brightly than during the years that Greg DeVries played on the team. It is a great honour to recognize him as an outstanding U of A alumnus and to add his name to the University’s Sports Wall of Fame.

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