Nurse, Lapeña call Canada home, hope to take national basketball teams to new heights

When you see the names of the towns Zaragoza, Spain, and Caroll, Iowa, you probably don’t think they have much in common, but both towns are the birthplaces of the head coaches for Canada’s women’s and men’s national basketball teams.

The women’s team is led by Víctor Lapeña while the men’s is led by Nick Nurse. Both have helped lead and plan on taking the programs to new levels.

The women’s team recently finished in fourth place at the 2022 Women’s Basketball World Cup, their best finish in 36 years.

“Canada, for me … now is my country,” Lapeña told CityNews about building a strong basketball program in Canada. “We are looking at a great future. Even why not a WNBA team close to the Raptors? So, I think the future [is] amazing. I love to be part of this process.”

Victor Lapeña is the head coach of the women’s national basketball team for Canada. CITYNEWS

The men’s team just finished a 10-0 run in the FIBA World Cup qualifiers and booked their ticket to next year’s FIBA World Cup with hopes of making it to the Olympics for the first time since 2000.

“I’m just happy with the steps we’ve made.” Nurse told CityNews. “There’s just such commitment, toughness, unselfishness by a big group of guys over all these competitions, and they’ve just gone and taken care of business for 40 minutes every night. It’s been really, really fun to watch it grow.”

Toronto Raptors head coach Nick Nurse also coaches the Canadian men’s national basketball team. CITYNEWS

Looking to make history in less than a week is Team Canada’s men’s soccer coach John Herdman, who is from Consett, England, but, like Lapeña and Nurse, also now calls Canada home.

Herdman helped transform the Canadian soccer system on both the men’s and women’s side. When he took over the men’s team they were ranked 94th in the world and now are playing in the FIFA World Cup for the first time since 1986 — the team’s first match is on Nov. 23 against Belgium.

Team Canada’s women’s soccer team is led by Bev Priestman who is also from Consett, England, and helped guide the women’s team to a gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics.

A 2016 file photo of John Herdman, then the coach of the Canadian women’s national soccer team, alongside Bev Priestman, who at the time was a member of his coaching staff. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Neil Davidson

While they all may not be Canadian citizens at the moment, they have helped bring their programs to historic achievements that have helped inspire new generations of fans and potential future stars in the national systems program because of their coaching ways.

For Lapeña, who is just 10 months into the job, it’s just the beginning for him.

“This is an amazing moment for women’s basketball. I think we have developed something special and I’m very, very happy to be part of this process to help the country to grow women’s basketball. To also have on my team some of the best players in the world, and especially to look for the future and to feel that, is brilliant,” Lapeña said.

Nurse has the balancing act of being both the head coach of the Toronto Raptors and the men’s national basketball team and has embraced being a part of the Canadian national system.

“I’ve had a chance to be a part of the 2012 Olympics with Great Britain, where I spent 11 years there, and I’m coming up on 10 here in Canada.” Nurse told CityNews. “Secondly, I’m entrenched in basketball in Canada. I’ve obviously been blessed when given this Raptors job, and when this national team job came about I thought I had some good international experience. I thought they maybe needed somebody with NBA experience because there are a lot of NBA Canadians playing. So I thought I had a good mix of maybe what they needed. So I just called up and asked them.”

“But for me, I mean, I live here. My two sons, both born here in Toronto, are Canadian passport holders. Hopefully, they’ll play for the team someday. So, no … I’m not from here, but I sure feel like I am.”

For Nurse, Lapeña, and Herdman, the end goal is of course the biggest stage in sports: the Olympics.

“With the talent we have and the future we have, I’m sure in the future we bring some medals for Canada and I would be very happy to do anything,” Lapeña added with a smile.

A huge part of the growth of the game in the country is also the notion of ‘if you can see it, you can be it’ mentality. In February of 2021 Sportsnet and Basketball Canada signed a first-of-its-kind partnership, to grow the game of basketball from coast to coast to coast. The multi-year innovative partnership will develop and launch several new national and international men’s and women’s basketball events in Canada, which included the Inaugural GLOBL JAM tournament which featured women’s and men’s teams from around the world competing in an Under-23 tournament, and it will be back in 2023.