FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament

The 2019 Raptors championship floor, last used at Oracle Arena where the 2019 NBA Champion Raptors defeated the Golden State Warriors, is now in Canada and installed in the Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre in Victoria, B.C. undergoing a complete refinishing. This very same floor has been graced by such greats as Kawhi Leonard, LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Steph Curry, Kyle Lowry, and Jamal Murray among others and will be used by future greats at the upcoming Olympic Qualifier tournament. This piece of Canadian history is currently being refinished by Cascadia Sport Systems for use in the FIBA Olympic Qualifiers, June 29 – July 4 2021. Every game of this summer’s FIBA Olympic Qualifier tournament will be played on this professional championship floor.

Cascadia will be sanding the surface down to raw wood and refinishing the floor with a new design. Of the 250 panels, weighing around 200 pounds each, approximately 17 panels will be replaced with new ones to allow some of the original panels to be retained for the Hall of Fame and to gift to key people involved in final game of the floor. The refinishing will include custom stain and International Basketball Federation logos. To be able to sand this at the arena, Cascadia came up with a custom dust extractor to eliminate dust impact to the facility. 25 large bags of wood dust were contained on just the rough sand alone. The floor, which is a Conner portable wood floor, was an older version that we upgraded and resized to meet the new NBA and FIBA regulations. One main upgrade was taking it from Non-Sprung to a Sprung System making it a better performing floor while reducing fatigue and injuries to players.

3 NBA championships have been won on this floor, and Team Canada aims to be the first to win an Olympic Qualifier. All of us here at Cascadia Sport Systems wish them all the very best of luck. Let the games begin!

Click to read further articles in The New York Times and Wood Floor Business.