The second half of the 2021 Canadian Premier League season was an exciting one for HFX Wanderers FC. After falling in the final to Forge FC the year before in the bubble on Prince Edward Island, the club was eager to get back into the playoffs again and push for a second crack at picking up the North Star Shield, the league’s ultimate prize.

Falling just short, a single point behind fourth-place York United after two losses and three draws in their final five matches of the season, it really seemed to sting. João Morelli would win the Player of the Year award and the Golden Boot in his first full CPL campaign, but it felt as though the team as a whole had come so close, but so far.

There was a silver lining, however, and it was the performance of young rookie goalkeeper Kieran Baskett. A born and raised Haligonian, Baskett had spent the entire first half of the season watching from the bench, other than a 2-1 victory over AS Blainville in the first round of the Canadian Championship, but in the second half of the season he got his chance and ran with it.

Baskett played 10 of the club’s final 12 matches down the stretch in pursuit of a playoff spot, going 3-4-3, and keeping four clean sheets. At the end of the season Baskett was the Wanderers’ selection for “The Next Gen” — a list of the best young players from each CPL club. He also earned himself a training stint with EFL Championship side Coventry City over the 2021-22 offseason.

For Baskett, just 19 years old when the 2021 season kicked off, to take the starting job from Christian Oxner was no small feat.

“I always backed myself to get there, and it turned out really well,” Baskett told CanPL.ca. “I had a good run of games at one point and it’s just a great experience getting some pro games under my belt, and I want to build off that.”

Now 20, and in his second year with his hometown club, minutes have been a little harder to come by again after Oxner seemingly won the starting job back, but Baskett has had a few opportunities, and says that the healthy competition between the two local products has been good for both of them — and that they have a good relationship off the pitch as well.

“It’s really important to have competition,” he said. “You always want to be stepping up the level at training and making each other better. I think Christian and I have a good relationship in that way, and we feed off each other and get better every day.”

That competitive spirit and drive to keep improving every day is something that the very best athletes have, and for Baskett it’s a trait passed down from his mother, Gillian Hamilton.

A top athlete in her own right, Hamilton represented Canada at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway, competing in biathlon. She raced in the women’s 7.5 kilometres sprint competition in Lillehammer, finishing 45th in an event won by the great Myriam Bédard, the first and so far only North American — male or female — to win gold in any biathlon event at the Winter Olympics.

She only found out she was going to Lillehammer about a month before the Games, after just missing out on the 1992 Games in Albertville, France.

“It was an amazing time in my life, I remember well the opening ceremonies and the Canadian team walking out into the stadium,” Hamilton recalled. “For a biathlete, as you might imagine, you’re not really used to seeing a lot of crowds, as opposed to maybe in soccer, where you do a bit more. I remember feeling very proud and excited.

“My race was quite early on in the Games, so I was very focused for the first little bit, I didn’t do much other than training and hanging out in the village. My best friend (fellow biathlete Kristin Berg) was my roommate at the Olympics, so we were there together and she’s still a really close friend. That was a pretty special experience to have together. For the race itself, I didn’t end up being all that nervous – I think in advance I thought I would be but I wasn’t. I was just relaxed and just knew to do my best. This is what I’m here for.”

Biathlon is a sport that requires concentration and the ability to stay calm under immense pressure — especially on the biggest stage at the Olympics. Keeping a cool head and focusing on the task at hand is vital when aiming a rifle after a lengthy ski, and while the sport itself is drastically different from soccer, there are similarities in that regard.

“My sport was very different from Kieran’s,” Hamilton said. “As it was an individual sport – cross country skiing and shooting – you can’t get more different from soccer, but when you’re in the midst of competition you’re just so focused on what you’re doing. You’re just in a particular zone, and afterwards I would go through the competition or whatever and think about it.

“I don’t think there were as intense moments as Kieran’s intense moments, let’s put it that way.”

One of the standout moments from Kieran’s career in the Canadian Premier League thus far is his huge penalty stop on Cavalry star Joe Mason in Calgary in the middle of October. With the Wanderers firmly in the playoff race still, the home side were awarded a penalty kick deep into stoppage time, and Baskett was the only thing standing between his side losing, or picking up an important clean sheet and point on the road.

Mason shot the ball to Baskett’s right side, but the young goalkeeper was equal to it, producing arguably one of the biggest moments of their entire season, and one that has been replayed many times since in commercials and advertisements around the league and broadcaster OneSoccer.

"Kieran Baskett, do you want to be a @HFXWanderersFC legend?"

The Halifax GK makes a HUGE stop on Joe Mason's penalty in the dying seconds of this 0-0 draw, giving his team a point in this crucial #CanPL clash ? pic.twitter.com/VbkY1DZWSo

— OneSoccer (@onesoccer) October 17, 2021

“To be honest, I don’t remember too much of actually being there saving the penalty,” Baskett admitted.

“But I remember before and after the game. I have lots of family in Calgary, her brother still lives there, she grew up there,” he said, gesturing to his mother sitting beside him during the interview. “I spent a lot of time with my family before and after the game and they were encouraging me so much. They were just so happy for me.

“It’s weird, often I kind of blank out those moments in games where I make a save, and I don’t really remember it at the time. I look back, and I’m like, ‘well, that was pretty good’,” he added with a laugh.

For Baskett, playing for his hometown club has been a special experience thus far. Halifax has fully embraced its CPL club, with Wanderers Grounds regularly packed full of fans, providing one of the best atmospheres in the league week in and week out. The Wanderers goalkeeper, although perhaps biased, is adamant that it’s the very best of the bunch.

That has been noticeable in the CPL, but in both of the past two seasons the club has also had the opportunity to welcome Canadian MLS clubs CF Montreal and Toronto FC to Halifax in the Canadian Championship. Although they would narrowly lose both matches, Baskett had a smile on his face when he thought back to those two nights under the lights in the Nova Scotian capital.

“It was amazing, the atmosphere was just incredible on the night,” he said of the Toronto FC visit in late May. “It could be the best atmosphere in Canadian football at the Wanderers Grounds, it’s just such a great environment. Same as against Montreal last year, a sellout crowd. Unfortunately we couldn’t get the result, but the fans really pushed us and almost got us there.”

Hamilton echoed those sentiments, but admits she gets a little nervous sometimes when she watches the Wanderers play, although she added that “it’s a fun experience every time I go to a game at Wanderers Grounds.”

Kieran has come a long way since “he was tiny, wanting to have the ball fired at him in doorways,” as Hamilton recalled with a smile, and she seemingly couldn’t be prouder of him.

“It was pretty funny in retrospect that he became a ‘keeper,” she added. “When he was in high school I started realizing he’s so passionate about this, he’s really going to push for it, and I knew he had a talent.”

After some time at a boarding school in the United States and a stint in the NCAA before returning to Halifax, Baskett has impressed enough to secure himself a spot at the professional level for the foreseeable future, evidently one of the better young shot-stoppers in the country, but he isn’t satisfied there.

His short term goal?

“To win the CPL with Halifax.”

After that he wants to see how far the sport can take him, and admittedly he has set himself some high long term targets. With that fighting spirit instilled in him, it’s a certainty that he’ll at least try his absolute best.

“Definitely playing for my country at some point has always been in the back of my mind,” he said. “I want to play in the [English] Premier League, because it’s what I grew up watching, so that would be the ultimate dream.

“Playing for my country, playing in the Premier League, and winning the CPL.”