Before tip-off at every game of the boys AAA Lower Mainland basketball tournament, Andrew Mavety soaked in the motivational words of his Point Grey coach.

Saad Fadl-Alla told his team: “Games are won by uncommon people because they’re willing to do things a common person won’t do. A common person is lazy and we want to become uncommon people.”

Mavety is one of those uncommon people. In a must-win game for fifth place in the Lower Mainland and a ticket to the B.C. championship, he scored 42 points and helped contain Churchill’s high-scoring threat Mindy Minhas to a single bucket. Against Tupper the previous night, Mavety scored 31 points and the Greyhounds would have won if it weren’t for a Christian Laettner-like jumper from the opposition as the horn sounded. Mavety averaged about 30 points through the regular season. After provincials wrap this weekend at the Langley Events Centre, he’ll commit to one of four Canadian universities that came calling.

He dribbles right, shoots left and scores from anywhere on the court. “He’s crafty,” said Pasha Bains, the director of Drive, a club basketball program in Vancouver that has counted Mavety amidst its ranks for years.

“He’s become a complete player. He can take a jump ball and guard every position on the court,” Bains said.

Universities that didn’t call will see him play on B.C.’s biggest stage and Bains believes many more might pick up the phone. “The next month is going to be big for him.”

Humble and hard-working, Mavety—who plays alongside his twin Patrick—doesn’t brag naturally and likes to show up at a packed gym where no one gives his Greyhounds a chance. That’s when he conjures coach Fadl-Alla’s source-unknown quotation. “When we go out there, no one is really expecting us to win,” said Mavety. “We use that as motivation because when you do win, the best part is hearing from everyone else, ‘How did you beat them? How could you have possibly beaten them?’ That part is the best. Doing things people don’t expect you to do.”

In other words, being uncommon. Mavety’s answer to the doubters: “I just laugh. You just gotta believe. Anything can happen.”

mstewart@vancourier.com

Twitter: @MHStewart