Since 2000, Kevin Hanson had been the face of UBC men’s basketball. Over his 25-year tenure, he became one of the all-time winningest basketball coaches in U Sports history. He had the most victories ever in Canada West, winning the conference six times. He was the national coach of the year twice and the conference coach of the year six times. That made his departure before the 2025-26 season all the more surprising.
“Honestly, it was very shocking. It kind of came out of nowhere,” said Tobi Akinkunmi, a recent grad and former team captain. “It was a pretty sad day when [Hanson] left.”
According to Akinkunmi, the team was provided with little information about the decision. All they were told was that Hanson would not be returning and that former UBC player and assistant coach Phil Jalalpoor would be serving as his interim replacement.
Since Jalalpoor was a member of the prior year’s coaching staff, there was at least a certain level of comfort in a familiar face for the team members who were returning. Despite that, it was still a massive change for everyone on the team. As for Jalalpoor, he was faced with the biggest opportunity of his career so far.
In addition to being in a completely new role as a first-time head coach, Jalalpoor was also handed a completely new roster. Having lost, in his estimation, 70 per cent of last year’s scoring to a mixture of graduation and transfers, Jalalpoor and his squad were always going to be fighting an uphill battle.
As he battled the odds on court, behind the scenes, Jalalpoor was also competing just as hard for his job. As an interim coach, your position with the team is never certain. It’s an inherently temporary measure, appointing somebody to the role because it cannot sit empty. Unlike full-time head coaches who can rely on their long-term contracts for job security, as an interim coach, there’s always an inflection point on the horizon where the team will either commit to you — or move on.
As Kavie Toor — UBC’s managing director of Athletics & Recreation — explained, when they face a quick turnaround to find a new head coach, UBC will appoint an interim for less than a year. After this, the athletics department does an extensive search to make sure they are “leaving no stone unturned.” For Toor and UBC Athletics, this meant taking over 150 applications.
“[It was] an extremely qualified candidate pool from across Canada [with] several U.S. … and even European applicants [as well],” said Toor.
Jalalpoor, true to his nature, seemed unfazed by this added pressure. Instead, he saw this period of time as a chance for him to do what he does best: compete. Instead of stressing about his job security, Jalalpoor committed himself fully to his team and began strengthening his relationships with his players.
“It doesn't really matter what role I have, I give 100 per cent.”
Coming into the season, expectations were high. UBC’s basketball program is historically very successful — thanks, in large part, to Hanson — and they were coming off a solid year in 2024-25 as a conference finalist, finishing sixth in the country after playing in the U Sports Final 8. The Thunderbirds’ conference record in 2025 was 15–5, one of the better marks in Canada. Now, the team was heading into 2026 with a new coach and massive roster turnover. A step back would be expected.
In 2026, Jalalpoor’s team finished conference play with a 15–5 record. The same record as the year prior. The playoff success was also the same. They made it back to the conference final. They made it back to the Final 8 and went toe-to-toe in their first match against the OUA champs, the TMU Bold. Despite everything, Jalalpoor had upheld the standard of success Hanson had established.
After the conclusion of the 2025-26 season, UBC Athletics removed his interim tag and named him the new, full-time head coach of the men’s basketball team. Now, Jalalpoor is locked in at least for the next five years. He’s earned it.
It wasn’t a given. Even at the highest levels of college basketball, replacing a head coach can produce, at best, spurious results.
Consider the Big-10 conference in the NCAA. The Big-10 had four teams appoint new head coaches last season. Two of them finished well below .500 (Maryland and Minnesota), while the other two finished with winning records, with one team advancing all the way to the Elite Eight (Iowa). It was essentially a coin flip.
The level of experience coming in didn’t seem to matter either. Buzz Williams, the head coach at Maryland, has taken three different schools to the NCAA tournament, multiple times each. He finished his first year at Maryland with an abysmal record. Regardless of the coach’s calibre, when a school hires a new leader, they are taking a chance.
When Jalalpoor was named interim head coach, it’s unlikely anyone knew what was going to happen. While he had been a presence in the program as an assistant and player, he had never held this level of responsibility. UBC Athletics had taken a gamble, or an educated guess, at best.
Now, after this year, the decision to promote Jalalpoor was no longer a gamble. He had proven himself. By the end of his first year, Jalalpoor had made it impossible for the university to give the job to anyone else.
How exactly did Jalalpoor find such quick success with such a new team? How were they able to nearly match their offensive output in every category from the year prior?
“We’re trying to play as fast as possible … the ball should never die,” said Akinkunmi.
Jalalpoor employs a modern style of basketball called “space and pace.” The idea is simple: by playing fast and having a high-intensity defence, you force turnovers — and the benefits cascade from there.
By forcing more turnovers, you get more possessions, which means more shots. If you get more shots up, you’ll score more points, and if you can do that, you’ll likely win lots of games. This fast-paced system also meant Jalalpoor was reaching deeper into his bench, often playing ten players in a game to keep everyone fresh. With more shots being taken, more players were given an opportunity to score.
Jalalpoor and the team lost a substantial amount of scoring coming into this season and he was forced to problem-solve. His system was the answer. It allowed young players to emerge as new stars and veteran players to improve drastically.
In 2024, Nylan Roberts averaged just three points a game. This past season, he averaged over 12. Meanwhile, Nikola Guzina, who had already established himself as a top player in the conference, improved in every major statistical category and began expanding his range beyond the three-point arc for the first time in his career.
Yet, implementing something like this isn’t easy. For a system of such high intensity to succeed, it requires an incredible level of buy-in from the players. Jalalpoor was able to get this out of his squad by investing back into his players and working with them to maximize their potential. That level of investment is easily identifiable in the way Jalalpoor carries himself on the sidelines.
At the final buzzer of the Canada West semifinal, when UBC took down Winnipeg in an overtime classic — Jalalpoor didn’t just celebrate. He hugged his assistant coaches and players before immediately turning back to jaw at some rowdy Winnipeg fans who had been chirping at him all game. His passion is intense, but his camaraderie and love for his team is unmistakable.
“Collective basketball, that's always what I termed my philosophy,” said Jalalpoor.
According to Toor, Jalalpoor’s priorities for his players are clear: they should develop as a leader, student and individual first, and the results on the basketball court will follow. By prioritizing the relationships he establishes with the people around him, the culture he’s built isn’t just healthy, but conducive to winning basketball games.
Jalalpoor’s collective mindset is reflected in the box score. This past season, three of his players averaged double-digit scoring, and a fourth came within a few points of reaching the same mark. Instead of having just one star player, UBC played as a team and the buy-in to the system from Jalalpoor’s players was obvious. It was not uncommon to see all five T-Birds touch the ball at least once on any given possession — no one was hogging the ball.
“I think [Hanson] was a very results-oriented coach … if you're not doing the best, he won’t really play you,” said Akinkunmi. “But with Phil, I feel like he’s more of a process-oriented coach. He's seen you put in all the work … and he has almost complete trust in you to play within your role.”
Jalalpoor has such a high level of trust in his players because of his focus on development. The leaps many players made this year on the court were sizable, and for players like Akinkunmi, it was clear that Jalalpoor’s emphasis on development made an impact.
“The general consensus between all of our guys was that it was an amazing change having Phil, just in the way he connected us.”
Akinkunmi is an incredibly versatile player, and his role varied greatly throughout his time at UBC. Earlier in his career, Akinkunmi had been a ball-dominant offensive player before slowly transitioning to the team’s defensive anchor and primary rebounder. Under Jalalpoor, Akinkunmi was asked to do a bit of everything. His three-point attempt numbers took a huge leap, but Akinkunmi remained one of the team’s most important and versatile on-ball defenders.
Most importantly for Akinkunmi this year, however, was how his coach helped him develop mentally. Akinkunmi plays with an intensity and passion that cannot be taught. As a leader on the team, his energy is contagious. But over the years, Akinkunmi had frequently struggled with getting frustrated over aspects of the game he could not control.
This past season, however, Akinkunmi felt he was able to stay level-headed on a consistent basis.
“Phil coached me a lot on [being able to] stay even-keeled the entire time,” he said. “It was a very big improvement from what I was before.”
The confidence that Jalalpoor had managed to instil in all of his players this year was something that Akinkunmi had never seen before — at any point in his basketball career. As it is with the competitive nature of sport, frustration will inevitably arise, whether about playing time or a player’s usage. However, Jalalpoor would frequently check in on players to make sure that his group remained tightly knit and confident in their abilities and roles.
As for Jalalpoor, his development as a leader and coach also shone through the year. Both Toor and Akinkunmi praised his flexibility and adaptability to challenges as the season progressed. He faced a steep learning curve, and while he was understandably a bit stressed at the start of the season, he leaned on those around him and poured himself into his work.
“He's not set in his ways. He's curious to learn, to grow, to pick other people's brains,” said Toor. “I think, collectively, that's why he's so good at what he does.”
With constant roster turnover, continuity in university sports is hard to find — but in his first year, Jalalpoor achieved it. It’s Jalalpoor’s qualities as a passionate, curious leader that make him so well-suited for this role.
Having a coach dedicated to fostering a strong team culture is both a breath of fresh air and a necessity. Kevin Hanson spent 25 years building his legacy at UBC. Now, Phil Jalalpoor is hoping to build his own, one relationship at a time.
