Houston star with Canadian ties named Big 12 Tournament’s top player

Canada Basketball surely is keeping its eyes on Emanuel Sharp.

The Houston star guard was named most outstanding player of the Big 12 Tournament after scoring 17 points in the Cougars’ 72-64 win over Arizona in the conference title game on Saturday.

Sharp, who averaged 20.7 points in three tournament games, is the son of former University of Toronto star Justine Ellison Sharp.

Ellison Sharp was inducted into the University of Toronto Varsity Blues hall of fame in 2009. The Hamilton, Ont., native was national university women’s athlete of the year in her senior 1995-96 season for the basketball team and led U of T to a pair of national silver medals.

After her university career, Justine went on to play pro hoops for 10 years in Israel, where she met her future husband and Emanuel’s dad, Derrick Sharp, who also had a long career playing basketball in that country. Derrick Sharp was a member of the 2005 Maccabi Tel Aviv team that stunned the Raptors in Toronto in a pre-season game.

“I grew up around professional basketball,” Emanuel Sharp told PaperCity Mag in 2023. “That’s really all I know. Coming from that background, I learned to enjoy the game that much more. Because as a kid you want to be like your parents.”

Emanuel was born in Tel Aviv in 2004. The family eventually moved to Florida, and Emanuel Sharp lists Tampa as his hometown.

Emanuel Sharp averaged 12.5 points per game this season, his third with Houston. His field-goal percentage (43.9) and three-point percentage (43.3) both are well up from previous seasons.

Houston, ranked second in the country, is expected to get a No. 1 seed on Selection Sunday for March Madness.