Star ahead and main scorer for the Duke Blue Devils. Freshman of the 12 months. A convention title and a high two seed in March Insanity.
Sure, these accomplishments might describe Cooper Flagg, the projected No. 1 decide within the upcoming NBA draft.
However in addition they belong to Toronto’s Toby Fournier.
Fournier, 19, has emerged as a star in her first season beneath head coach Kara Lawson in Durham, N.C., averaging 13.4 factors and 5.3 rebounds per recreation for the 14-4 Blue Devils ladies’s group. Second-seeded Duke faces No. 15 Lehigh to open the NCAA match on Friday.
Extremely recruited out of Crestwood Preparatory School, Fournier shortly emerged as one in every of Lawson’s most trusted gamers, absorbing practically 20 minutes per contest off the bench in her rookie season.
The Toronto native’s prompt success got here as no shock to high-school head coach Marlo Davis.
“She’s nonetheless Toby and nonetheless having enjoyable and it seems like she’s having fun with what she’s doing, her willingness to compete, her willingness to do no matter her group wants from her, and simply her willingness and skill to indicate up,” Davis stated. “It lends itself to a whole lot of the success that she’s having proper now as a person and as a group.”
In highschool, the six-foot-two Fournier rose to nationwide fame by way of her skill to dunk — a uncommon talent in ladies’s basketball.
WATCH | Fournier on showcasing her dunking:
Toby Fournier is a 17-year-old basketball participant on the Canadian ladies’s basketball group. She spoke to CBC Sports activities about showcasing her dunking talents and representing Canada on the world stage.
However her continued improvement as a participant has proven she could be a lot greater than only a dunker.
“Toby performs the sport at a extremely excessive degree athletically,” Lawson advised The Duke Chronicle. “She’s capable of rating, she’s capable of rebound and he or she’s capable of block photographs.”
Fournier racked up 1.1 blocks per recreation, shot 38.5 per cent from three-point vary and nailed simply over two-thirds of her free throws.
“She’s among the best defensive gamers in our league. She will be able to guard one by way of 5. You’ll be able to rely on one hand in our league — not simply freshmen — gamers that may try this adequately,” Lawson stated.
Davis, additionally the top coach of Canada’s under-18 ladies’s group, is planning to attend the ladies’s Last 4 in Tampa, Fla., the place he might realistically see a pair of Crestwood alumnae in Fournier (of No. 2 seed Duke) and Shayeann Day-Wilson (No. 3 LSU) meet within the championship recreation.
The 38-year-old, a former faculty basketball participant himself, stays in contact with Fournier by way of textual content.
“When she first bought to campus [at Duke], she made a joke and was like, ‘Man, you are proper about every thing. And it is so much tougher [than] in highschool. And I really converse much more in apply and issues like that.’
“These had been simply cool moments to the touch on her adapting shortly to the school recreation.”
WATCH | Canadians prepared for March Insanity:
Canadian freshman Syla Swords, Jasmine Bascoe, and Delaney Gibb preview the joy of the 2025 NCAA March Insanity match which tips-off this week.
A part of Fournier’s motivation this 12 months may need come from watching fellow NCAA gamers Syla Swords, Cassandre Prosper and Yvonne Ejim play for Canada on the Paris Olympics final summer season whereas she watched at dwelling.
It is nonetheless early, but when Fournier maintains her tempo, her spot on the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic squad could also be plain.
And she or he might even group up there with fellow Crestwood grad Aaliyah Edwards, a two-time Olympian and WNBAer herself.
“Man, that might be superb to see,” Davis stated. “I imply, as a highschool, we won’t be prouder to have had Aaliyah and to say that we have had an Olympian from our program. However to say that we had two I feel is nothing wanting superb.”
After all, Fournier is not the one future Canadian nationwide group star concerned in March Insanity.
Swords averaged 16.1 factors per recreation in her freshman marketing campaign with Michigan, which earned a No. 6 seed and will meet Fournier’s Blue Devils within the Last 4.
Prosper, coming off a leg harm final season, emerged as a stable bench piece for Notre Dame, which is a No. 3 seed and lined as much as face Swords and Michigan within the Spherical of 32.
Tenth-seeded Oregon boasts six-foot-eight Canadian Phillipina Kyei, a former Crestwood participant who Davis stated brings pleasure to the basketball court docket and who might line up head-to-head within the publish in opposition to Fournier within the Spherical of 32.
Day-Wilson herself was as soon as an ACC Freshman of the 12 months with Duke however transferred to Miami final 12 months earlier than touchdown with LSU this season.
The 21-year-old began 20 video games for Kim Mulkey’s Tigers, averaging simply 3.5 factors.
“Shayeann is a competitor, a warrior. And like Toby, when the lights are on, that is when she shines the brightest. And I am excited to see her as a result of this was one thing that we talked about when she was 11, 12 years previous,” Davis stated.
All of it provides as much as optimism for Canada’s ladies’s senior group, which remains to be searching for its first-ever Olympic medal.
“The sky is the restrict for our nationwide group,” Davis stated. “There is a particular trickle-down impact from our nationwide program to our highschool packages, to our provincial groups. … They’re putting the emphasis in the precise locations and it is exhibiting with the expansion of our recreation.”
And on the centre of all of it is Fournier, who might now launch herself into cross-border prominence with a powerful March Insanity.
“Her aggressive nature goes to be on full show,” Davis stated. “We have been in related conditions at the highschool degree, the place it is huge occasions, huge video games, a whole lot of eyes and in truth these are Toby’s largest moments. So I am excited to see her beneath these vibrant lights.”
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