lot of horse and buggys,” she says. After a decade of living in Toronto and abroad (and earning her MSc in Health, Community and Development program at the London School of Economics as well as a Graduate Diploma in Social Innovation from the University of Waterloo), Sutherland moved up north and started Thinking Rock Community Arts.

For a region that has long struggled with youth out-migration and ‘brain drain’, the influx of young entrepreneurs (who now have the option of telecommuting), artists and organizers like Sutherland is a boon. “I found a lot of allies in this community—other young people that were getting stuff started. We became good friends with the guys from Outspoken Brewery and lived above Shabby Motley when they were starting up. It felt like wehim. His players are asked every day about the nightmare of last June and what it did to their competitive psyche. His coach speaks often about how how it drove them at every turn during this regular season in which they recovered to post the league's best record. Buford stayed in the background as he always does, hoping the roster that he built with Popovich would find a way to make those memories disappear.

"I think we're still in the mourning period," Buford admitted. "It's not a time that begins and ends."

It was a lesson learned the hard way that will most certainly be on all of their minds Sunday night.

"I don't know that (the 2013 Finals) left any of our minds, but ... it's not what we do