A yearly basketball series between two teams in the southeast has been cancelled this year, following a spate of harassment and threats.

The stop was announced yesterday, with both schools agreeing to skip the games this year due to safety concerns.

The McLeod series started nearly a century ago in 1932 and has had a few breaks over the years – most recently in 2021 due to COVID-19, but a few have also been due to potential violence.

Estevan Comprehensive School Principal Nathan Johnson says that the whole affair was due to multiple incidents over the years.

"Definitely some concerns were raised about various incidents during the basketball series over the years. Think maybe the breakdown was a miscommunication about how we were going to proceed. We're disappointed that this is the situation, but look forward to getting us going again in the future."

Even with a year off, Johnson says he's hopeful that the McLeod series can come back again.

"I see us definitely trying to get it going again, putting some - I wanna say safeguards, but I don't know if that's the right word - but definitely planning for a successful event in the future."

In the meantime, those basketball teams are gearing up for plenty of other games in Saskatchewan.

"Our teams are definitely looking forward to the remainder of the scheduled season and the SHSA playoffs. Our teams, as always, are working towards a successful playoff run and that's going to be the goal of all of our sports teams here at ECS."