Grassick leads Huskies on the court and in the classroom

The epitome of a student-athlete, the fourth-year point guard has taken her game to a new level, leading the country in assists per game as she builds on her remarkable resume after earning accolades as an All-Canadian athlete and an Academic-All Canadian student last season while leading the Huskies all the way to the national championship game.

“You can’t have personal success without team success, and I was fortunate to be a part of a great team that went on a great run last year and we are focused on doing that again this year,” said Grassick, a Canada West conference all-star from Prince Albert, who scored a tournament-leading 30 points in USask’s heartbreaking 70-67 loss to Carleton University in the 2024 national final. “Sometimes heartbreak is what drives you, especially as a team. You look back to last year and there were only a couple of us who had experienced nationals before, so this year having that extra year of experience and having so many returning players, we know what we have to do to get back there this year.”

To be sure, Grassick is showing the way, with the 2023-24 second-team All-Canadian standout leading the Huskies in scoring this season (16.8 points along with 5.6 rebounds per game) while also leading the entire country in assists (6.0 per game) and being one of the top three-point shooters (40.5 per cent) in U SPORTS. Impressively, she is doing all of that on the court while also leading the team in the classroom as an Academic All-Canadian (a better than 80 per cent academic average) while taking a demanding full course load in pharmacy.

“Managing both pharmacy and basketball at the same time is challenging at times, so having time management skills is important,” said Grassick, one of 121 of 450 Huskie student-athletes who were named Academic All-Canadians last year. “I always say that basketball is a distraction sometimes from university and you can fully immerse yourself in basketball for a while and then when you sit down to study, you are that much more focused. I am proud of (Academic All-Canadian honours), but I am also proud of my teammates. We had seven Academic All-Canadians on our team last year, so I think it just stresses the importance of working hard, not just in basketball but in the classroom. We just have an excellent group of young women who strive to succeed on the court and in school.”

That commitment to completing classes and passes comes naturally for Grassick.

“Growing up, my parents always stressed the importance of academics,” she said. “My mom is a teacher, so doing well in school was always something that was ingrained in me, to take pride in what you do in the classroom. Basketball only takes you so far in life, so with school, being able to manage your time is so important. But it’s like a full-time job: you get up and go to school all day every day and then you have to manage the workload of basketball every day as well. But I wouldn’t give it up for the world.”

A determined defender, Grassick has quickly become the floor general for her teammates, with the offence expertly running through her hands at the point guard position on a Huskies team that is ranked third in the nation with a 14-2 record and is leading the country offensively, averaging 82.5 points per game.

“I think as a point guard, you change your role every game,” she said. “If it’s your night to score, you score, but if someone else is shooting the ball well, as a point guard you try to find them as much as possible. So I am fortunate as a point guard to be able to have an impact on the game and help so many of my teammates excel … When you take a step back, you realize that you are surrounded by greatness every day with your teammates, your coaches, your trainers. So you raise yourself to that standard.”

So how does Huskies head coach Lisa Thomaidis gauge Grassick’s importance and contributions to the team?

“What Gage has been able to do, both in the classroom and on the court, is truly remarkable,” said Thomaidis, who won her third U SPORTS coach of the year award and sixth Canada West coach of the year honours in her 25th season in 2024, and also led Germany to a berth in the Olympic quarter-finals in Paris last summer after helping the country’s women’s basketball team qualify for its first-ever Summer Games. “Gage has a maturity about her and a work ethic that doesn’t allow for anything less than her best. She is so grounded in her values and commitment to excellence and I’ve never seen it waver.”

“She means everything to our team,” added Thomaidis, who became the winningest women’s basketball coach in Canada West conference history on Saturday, Feb. 1 when the Huskies beat the MacEwan Griffins 91-35 for her record 345th career victory. “She’s our leader on and off the court. She leads by example, but at the same time, she isn’t afraid to speak up when things need to be said. It’s been a privilege to coach Gage and I’m just so happy that we get to have another year with her.”

For Grassick, the focus is on getting her team back to the national championship and finishing the job this year.

With only four games remaining before the start of the playoffs, including this weekend’s U-Prairie Challenge versus their provincial rival University of Regina Cougars – Friday in Regina and Saturday in Saskatoon (5 pm, Physical Activity Complex) – the Huskies are hoping to cap their season in style.

“We have a different drive this year,” said Grassick. “Last year, as proud as we were of the season, we still came up short, so it’s a bit of extra motivation because you want to get back there and you want to make your mark. But I think our team is pretty good at not looking too far into the future and focusing on today and the next game. Coach always likes to say, today we can get one per cent better, and that just keeps us focused on our goal.”

As for life after Huskies basketball, Grassick is dedicated to completing her studies to become a pharmacist, but also has dreams of extending her career on the court as well.

“Coming out of high school, I always wanted to go into health care,” she said. “I am fortunate that my older cousin is a pharmacist, so I was able to sit down and shadow a couple of pharmacists, so just being able to see the difference they make in the world and how much of an impact pharmacists are going to have in the coming years is really inspiring. I can confidently say that I made the right career choice.”

After seeing her former teammates Carly Ahlstrom, Libby Epoch and Summer Maskewich moving on to play professionally in Europe, Grassick hasn’t ruled out the possibility of extending her basketball career overseas after she graduates, before beginning her career as a pharmacist.

“Hearing their stories of playing overseas is really inspiring and is something that I am also hoping to be able to do when I am finished here, because I think it is really cool, especially seeing how women’s basketball has grown in popularity,” she said. “As a young athlete, it is inspiring. When I was in high school, I could not name you one player who was in the WNBA or who was playing pro overseas, and now I know a lot of people. So as a young athlete, dreams that were far-fetched, aren’t so far-fetched anymore.”

Third-year Huskies men’s hockey forward and Edwards School of Business student Liam Keeler helped Canada’s hockey team win the gold medal at the 2025 FISU Winter World University Games in Torino, Italy. Canada beat Slovakia 3-1 in the championship final on Jan. 22 … Jessica Pawlik of USask’s Huskies Health, who works with Huskies women’s hockey, wrestling and track and field, also served as a sports therapist for Team Canada at the FISU Games … Huskie Athletics currently has seven teams ranked in the national Top 10: men’s hockey (No.2), women’s basketball (No.3), women’s track and field (No.3), women’s wrestling (No.6), men’s wrestling (No.6), men’s volleyball (No.7), and men’s track and field (No.7) … Five members of the Huskies football team – LB Seth Hundeby, LB Lane Novak, WR Daniel Wiebe, WR Rhett Vavra and RB Ryker Frank – will take part in the CFL Combines scouting sessions March 21-23 in Regina, in preparation for this year’s CFL draft on April 29 … Canadian Olympian Paige Crozon of Humboldt, a FIBA  3X3 women’s basketball champion, will be this year’s keystone speaker at the Huskie Women of Influence breakfast on Feb. 11. Tickets are available here.