Kyrell Sopotyk
Biography
Sports were always a big part of Kyrell Sopotyk’s life growing up. The Aberdeen, Sask. native played everything from basketball to volleyball and ran track and field in high school.
Sopotyk’s sport of choice was on the ice, where he spent two seasons playing with the Western Hockey League’s Kamloops Blazers.
However, Sopotyk’s hockey career abruptly ended in January 2021 when he suffered a spinal cord injury in a snowboarding accident at Table Mountain near North Battleford, Sask.
Knowing Sopotyk came from an athletic background, his recreational therapist encouraged him to try a variety of adaptive sports as part of his rehabilitation.
In addition to wheelchair basketball, Sopotyk has competed in wheelchair racing, where he won a bronze medal for Saskatchewan in the male 1,500-metre wheelchair race at the 2022 Canada Summer Games in August.
Sopotyk, who began playing wheelchair basketball in October 2021, finally got to test his skills in a competitive environment at the 2022 CWBL Nationals in Montreal and then the 2022 Junior Nationals in Charlottetown, P.E.I.
He made his Senior Men’s National Team debut at the 2025 IWBF Americas Cup.
Off the court, Sopotyk will attend the University of Arizona in September 2025, where he’ll major in business management while playing for the Arizona Wildcats.