Wheelchair athlete looking to Paris in 2024
Ugpi’ganjig’s (Eel River Bar) Desiree Isaac-Pictou took home gold medal at national championships on weekend
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It’s been a busy eight months or so for Ugpi’ganjig’s (Eel River Bar) Desiree Isaac-Pictou and she’s hoping it stays that way as she continues to work toward an Olympic medal.
Isaac-Pictou took part in the Wheelchair Basketball Canada national championships in Fredericton on the weekend where her squad won the Division 2 gold medal Sunday after beating the Edmonton Inferno 62-44.
That came on the heels of her national team qualifying for the 2024 Paris Summer Paralympics a couple of weeks ago after Canada defeated Algeria 88-30 at the IWBF Repechage Tournament in Osaka, Japan.
“It was exciting to beat Algeria to qualify for the 2024 Paris Paralympics,” she said on Monday. “My teammates have been through a lot this past year and were really deserving of this. I am proud of them.”
The 24-year-old communications agent moved back to her home community in 2022 when she started playing wheelchair basketball on the heels of losing both legs in an accident while attending a mud bog event in Bathurst in the summer of 2020.
“I practice alone two times a week at the DRHS gym and once a week with a coach in Miramichi,” she said. “Starting this summer, I plan on practising more by centralizing with the team across Canada in cities like Winnipeg, Quebec City and Toronto.”
In the last year, Isaac-Pictou was a member of Canada’s team that placed sixth at the women’s U25 world wheelchair basketball championships in Thailand and soon after, she and coach Clary Stubbert were awarded one of 13 Petro Canada Fuelling Athlete and Coaching Excellence awards worth $5,000 to continue her wheelchair basketball development.
She was one of two New Brunswickers who competed for Team Canada at the Parapan Pan Am Games in Santiago, Chile, in November. The other was Rothesay’s Colin Higgins.
Her next goal is to make the Olympic team, which she said would be an honour as she would be the first woman from the region to take part in any Olympic summer games.
“I am still so new to the sport and my skill level isn’t quite as high as the rest of my teammates on the Senior Women’s team yet, so it’s hard to say whether or not being on the ParaPan American and IWBF Repechage teams will give me an advantage to being named to the Paralympic team. However, I plan on continuing to vigorously train throughout the summer to hone my skills and prove myself.”
The 2024 Paris Paralympic Games take place from Aug. 28 to Sept. 8.
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