Lokosang Moses

What His Father Gave Him

A second-year player carries family sacrifice into a shared ambition.

Lokosang Moses grew up watching his older brother play basketball. When his brother came home from collegiate competition, the game came with him.

Watching became playing. Playing became training together. The example was close enough to feel possible: someone from his own family had reached that level, and was helping him find his way toward it.

There is a particular value in having a role model who comes home. Collegiate basketball was not only something Lokosang saw from a distance. His brother could bring it into the family’s life, then help him work toward the skills it required. The influence became practical: watching led to coaching, and admiration became time spent learning.

His father’s support made those chances easier to pursue. Lokosang remembers him making an effort to ensure he had what he needed. That kind of care can sit quietly behind an athlete’s progress, visible most clearly to the person receiving it. He has not forgotten.

His father made the pursuit possible in another way, going out of his way to provide what Lokosang needed to compete. That support remains central to how he understands the opportunity he has now.

Being cut from his school’s intermediate team in Grade 7 gave his ambition a sharper edge. He believed he could play with the athletes who had been selected. The disappointment pushed him to work harder, and he sees that response as a turning point in his development.

Now entering his second year of eligibility with the Lightning, Lokosang returns to the sacrifices his parents made whenever things get difficult. His late father remains a powerful motivation. Remembering what his father and mother did for their children gives the work a meaning beyond the next game.

This season, he wants to help St. Mary’s reach the playoffs and make a meaningful run. Further ahead, the ambition expands: an ACAC championship, nationals, and ultimately a national title.

His definition of success includes what has to happen before a team can achieve any of that.

“The ability for a collective to buy in,” he says.

He wants a group committed to the same purpose, willing to make individual effort useful to everyone else.

The playoff ambition depends on that commitment. A meaningful run requires players to keep believing in the same work through the parts of a season that do not reward them immediately. Lokosang’s longer-term championship goals grow from the same idea: the group has to choose what it is pursuing together.

His family gives him a personal reason to make that choice seriously. On difficult days, remembering his parents’ sacrifices puts his own work in a larger context. Basketball is something he wants for himself, and an opportunity made possible by people who wanted a better life for their children.

His brother showed him the collegiate game. His parents helped him pursue it. Lokosang enters this season thinking about what he can add to a team—and carrying the people who helped him reach it.