Honey Badgers, Surge look to continue win streaks in cross-conference tilt

A pair of squads who started slow out of the gates are set to put multi-game winning streaks on the line on Wednesday night.

The Brampton Honey Badgers (5-8), winners of two straight, will be hosting the Calgary Surge (6-5) and their four-game winning streak at the CAA Centre at 7:30 p.m. ET/ 5:30 p.m. MT. The game will be streamed on CEBL+ and TSN+.

For the Honey Badgers, their back-to-back wins haven’t come easy. They backed up a three-point win against the Montreal Alliance on Friday with an even tighter two-point victory over the Scarborough Shooting Stars on Sunday.

The common thread for Brampton has been excellent bench play. After 43 bench points against Montreal, they surged to 56 against Scarborough.

Brampton has also benefitted from better offensive output all around. After reaching 90 points just three times in their first 10 games, the team’s hit that mark in three straight contests.

Slowly but surely, the Honey Badgers are climbing out of their last-place mark in points per game, and a test against Calgary’s stout defense will be the next step in that battle.

On the Surge’s side, their winning streak has been rather dominant.

Calgary has won all four of its games by a double-digit margin during its winning streak and have an average margin of victory of over 15 points across that stretch. Naturally, their winning streak began against the Honey Badgers on June 16.

After a 2-5 start to the season, the reigning CEBL runner-ups are beginning to look more like the team that many expected when the new campaign began this spring.

The Surge’s balanced scoring has been a key part of their recent hot streak. Six different Calgary players have averaged between 13 and 18 points over the last five games, led by Canadian Mathieu Kamba’s 17.8 points per game in that span.

After once sitting in the Western Conference’s basement, the Surge can get one step closer to catching up to the Edmonton Stingers and Vancouver Bandits with a victory on Wednesday night.

Meanwhile, the Honey Badgers are just 2.5 games back of the Niagara River Lions for top spot in the East and will inch closer if they can get past Calgary.

Key matchup

Calgary’s Sean Miller-Moore and Brampton’s Shamiel Stevenson are two of the top Canadian scorers in the entire league this season, and both will surely spend some time guarding each other on Wednesday.

The two physical wings are both averaging right around 17 points per game, ranking in the top-15 league wide, and play a big role on the boards as well.

When Brampton and Calgary squared off last month, Stevenson put up a team-best 18 points, but it was Miller-Moore’s well-rounded stat line of 10 points, eight rebounds, and three assists that helped the Surge pull out a win.

Milestone watch

• Calgary’s Stefan Smith is 18 points away from 500 for his career, including playoffs

• Brampton’s Zane Waterman is three rebounds away from 250 for his career, regular season only

• Brampton’s Prince Oduro is seven blocks away from 50 for his career, including playoffs

About the CEBL

A league created by Canadians for Canadians with a mission to develop Canadian players, coaches, sports executives, and referees, the CEBL boasts the highest percentage of Canadian players of any pro league in the country with 75% of its rosters being Canadian and a record 10 players with NBA experience in 2024. Players also bring experience from the NBA G League, top international pro leagues, the Canadian National team program, NCAA programs, as well as U SPORTS and CCAA. Fourteen players have signed NBA contracts following a CEBL season, and numerous CEBL players attend NBA G League training camps every year. The CEBL season runs from May through August with games broadcast live on CEBL+ powered by BetVictor, TSN, TSN+, RDS, Game+, Next Level Sports & Entertainment and Courtside1891. More information about the CEBL is available at CEBL.ca and @cebleague on Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook & YouTube.