Feb 26 - Back to back to back champions

Good morning !

The forecast anticipates “wet flurries” today, and possibly tomorrow, in what may be the last taste of anything resembling snow in this mild winter.

— Cam

Today’s approx. read time: 5 minutes

🌡️ Weather Forecast

Today: 🌦️ 7 / -3  

Tomorrow: 🌧️ 5 / 4

Wednesday: 🌧️ 9 / 3

7-day forecast

NEWS

UVic men three-peat as champs with Sunday comeback

The national #1 Vikes (20-3) will head to the national Final 8 tournament as back-to-back-to-back Canada West champions. It’s the first three-peat in the western university league in 40 years—since UVic’s ’70s/’80s dynasty won seven straight.

Victoria beat Winnipeg for a second straight year yesterday, winning in Manitoba despite going down 19-35 in the first quarter. UVic pulled to within 6 at half, then finally gained the lead (70-68) to end the third and expanded it to 8 in the fourth before holding on to win 96-91. Watch a few highlights here.

UVic was also national #1 last year, but wound up unexpectedly matched with (and losing to) defending champion Carleton in the national tourney. This year, though, UVic again has a real shot at a 9th championship and first since 1997. The team boasts a national MVP candidate in Oak Bay's Diego Maffia, who is Canada's leading scorer and Canada West's Player of the Year in back-to-back seasons.

The Final 8 tourney is March 8-10 in Quebec City.

UVic women's Cinderella run ends in 4th

After digging out from an 0-7 early-season hole, they climbed to 10-10 and beat the 7th and 2nd, setting up a semifinal with the 6th. But their luck ran out vs U of A, and they lost the bronze match to UFV. 

A medal could have secured a true Cinderella run to Nationals; a wild card berth is possible but unlikely for a team not ranked in the national top 10. Still, fourth remains a strong finish and is their best result since 2015. Abigail Becker was a third-team All-Star.

Women's rugby 7s gets silver

Those Vikes also had their playoffs last weekend, and outscored their first four rivals 114-15 total before falling 0-19 to UBC in the final. With a 12-2 record, they're off to nationals in Montreal on March 17.

⚠️ Capital Bulletin

11,000 local power outages on Sunday, mainly affecting Westshore, peninsula, Duncan, and Galiano. [Updates]

Beaver Lake Beach will have intermittent closures in March for waterline replacement. 

“Call police” sign on bus was a glitch, BC Transit tells CHEK, not a real crisis.

How to pursue a refund if you were booked on defunct airline Lynx. Some other airlines are offering Lynx make-up flights today. [City / CP]

Saanich council meeting today at 7. Here's the agenda.

Driving today? Check the current traffic situation via Google.

NEWS

Locals plan more medical donations to Ukraine as war marks two years

Several hundred gathered in Centennial Square on Saturday to mark the second anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine and to call for an end to the war.  

Some 1,500 refugees have been brought to the Island, often relying on donations of food and supplies. A play about the onset of the war was staged a month ago at Langham Court as a fundraiser. 

A Westshore-based group has also been organizing donations and medical supply delivery trips to the country. Vancouver Island Supports Ukraine, led by retired Langford fire chief Bob Beckett, is now raising funds to purchase medical equipment to create a breast milk bank for the Ivano-Frankivsk Regional Children's Hospital. 

On the group's most recent trip, Beckett recalled, they saw not only the wounded soldiers they expected but also a tenfold increase in premature babies. The group wants to send a human milk analyzer, a pasteurizer, a medical freezer, and a pharmaceutical refrigerator.

Read more about the initiative, and what the locals saw on their aid trip, in The Westshore.

⭐️ Capital Picks

📷 Seabird or sea serpent? Looking almost like little Loch Ness monsters, the strange Brandt's cormorants float near Ogden Point as breeding season begins. [Photo]

📈 Rising Economy, the business event for business insiders, is March 6 - 8 in Victoria. Tickets are going fast - get yours today.*

📣 Call for volunteers to help at the Victoria Sexual Assault Centre. [Info] 

🤝 Now hiring: Pyrotechnician at Butchart Gardens.

*Sponsored Listing

NEWS

Where to have afternoon tea in Victoria

As the home of Canada’s oldest tea company, Victoria has a long history with tea and a passion for it that continues to this day.

A traditional staple has been afternoon tea, enjoyed at Victoria institutions for over a century. A hot pot of tea is served alongside a tiered platter filled with handheld sweet and savoury bites to eat.  

Tasting Victoria rounded up some of the best local places for a hot cuppa (and some treats) in a relaxing atmosphere.

🗞️ In Other News

Pacific Baroque Festival returns tomorrow for 20th year
The Victoria Conservatory of Music’s week-long annual festival celebrates the 17th century Italian genre. The six events showcase the style and teach about how it arose as a movement for more direct, poetic expression in music. 

Jubilee patient gets TV, but others remain without 
The former nurse had been without entertainment for months, and though her set is now repaired other patients have emerged with similar complaints. The contractor denies a dispute with Island Health, and disputes the number of broken TVs. [Times Colonist]

Banished man argues arson sentence would be double punishment 
BC's highest court will hear the argument that 21 months in jail add excessively to the six-month exile handed out by the Wei Wai Kum First Nation near Campbell River. The man burned his own home in response to the First Nation moving to sell it after he defaulted on the mortgage. [CTV] 

Greater Victoria's soccer teams will face off this spring
Pacific FC and Highlanders FC were paired up by the draw for the first round of the multi-league Canadian Cup, beginning Apr. 23.

🗓️ Things to do

🎶 Taylor Swift drop-in choir: Sing along to Taylor tunes with All Together Now at Victoria Event Centre. Today. Doors 7pm, singing 7:30pm. 

🎥 Anatomy of a Fall at Cinecenta: The Academy Award nominated French legal drama will be shown at the UVic theatre. Today. 4:45pm and 7:30pm. 

🐾 Emergency preparedness—for pets: How to prepare to care for a pet in a disaster. Tomorrow (7-8pm) at Gordon Head Rec.

👀 In Case You Missed It

Tiny Town returns in new BC-Victoria deal on homelessness. Plus: Seedy Sunday’s legacy. Local First Nations’ clean energy projects. [Sun. newsletter]

More recycling and compost bins in Victoria, in new phase of plan to cut waste in half. [Capital Daily]

What’s in BC’s new budget? Here is the rundown.

The teacup tree blossoms in James Bay. [Photos]

Another Tsartlip teen soccer player heads to play in Spain. [CHEK] 

That’s it!

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