Hometown hero hits CEBL championship clinching shot

Chapter 1 of Winnipeg Sea Bears basketball was capped by hometown hero Chad Posthumus.

It was May 27, 2023, and the late, great centre out of River East Collegiate had a put-back basket off a Teddy Allen miss to give the Sea Bears a 90-85 victory over the Vancouver Bandits in Winnipeg’s inaugural game, in front of what was then a record crowd of 7,303.

So, on Saturday, it was rather poetic that Simon Hildebrandt — another Winnipegger and a player Posthumus used to mentor — was the one to put an exclamation mark on the franchise’s latest and greatest chapter.

Hildebrandt drilled a wide-open three in Target Score Time to crown the Sea Bears as the 2026 CEBL champions.

The new CEBL record crowd of 12,519 inside Canada Life Centre went ballistic as Hildebrandt’s shot cemented a 98-84 win over the Brampton Honey Badgers in a winner-take-all showdown.

“I think if Chad was watching the game and could handpick who was gonna hit the game-winning basket, I think he would’ve picked Simon,” said Sea Bears head coach Mike Raimbault.

Charles Posthumus, Chad’s father, shared a similar sentiment.

“Chad is beaming in heaven,” Charles told the Free Press. “Simon and him were very close.”

Hildebrandt did a whole lot more than just score the final bucket.

The 23-year-old — who was a star at Mennonite Brethren Collegiate Institute and then the University of Manitoba before playing NCAA hoops at High Point and Washington State — played nearly 38 minutes and finished second on the Sea Bears in scoring with 24 points and six rebounds.

“Even though Chad’s not with us today, he still means so much to this organization, so much to this city, and I think he just exemplifies what the Sea Bears are all about — just the way he would walk into the room and change the energy and everything he did to give back to the community and give back to the city,” said Hildebrandt.

“I remember when he hit that first Target Score winner and how special of a moment it was for everyone around and everyone involved. To be compared to that and to hit the last one today is special.”

Posthumus died in November 2024 at the age of 33. The Sea Bears retired his No. 33 jersey in the 2025 season opener.

“I think he’d just give me a Chad-patented big bear hug. I think that would be the one thing he’d do,” said Hildebrandt.

“There’s just a lot of memories of him coming back today. Obviously, I wish more than anything that he was here with us, but I know he’s looking down on us with a big smile and just cheering — that’s Chad.”

The Sea Bears wouldn’t have reached the top of the CEBL mountain without Hildebrandt’s heroics.

The club lost three starters — Allen, Emmanuel Akot and Jeremiah Tilmor Jr. — right before the post-season, thrusting Hildebrandt into a more prominent role.

In 20 regular-season games, he averaged 5.3 points and 3.2 rebounds in 17.5 minutes.

During the three-game playoff run, he averaged 18.3 points and 5.6 rebounds in 35 minutes.

Hildebrandt, who is also getting married this week, will leave for Germany soon to play for BBC Bayreuth.

“His entire summer, he was obviously in a situation where at times guys were playing and ahead of him and he had to sacrifice,” said Raimbault.

“There were certainly a large number of games in the early portion of the season where it would have been easy for him to look back and say ‘I should have played more’ or ‘I should have had this’ but Simon never made it about himself and I think that had major trickle down into the rest of the group buying into what we were trying to do.

“Simon very much led by example in terms of how he dealt with adversity.”

Hildebrandt was a U Sports developmental player for the Sea Bears back in 2023. Fast-forward a few years, and he’s now one of the CEBL’s biggest success stories.

“Just being a kid from Winnipeg who grew up here, it just means so much to me that I’m able to do this in this city,” said Hildebrandt.

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