Team Asper from the Asper school of business at the U of M has placed third out of approximately 60 competitors in the 37th annual national MBA games held from Jan. 3 to 5.
The event took place in Vancouver, B.C. and was hosted by University Canada West, the school that won last year’s games.
The MBA games is an annual competition which began in 1988 by Queen’s University. This year, more than 300 MBA students from 14 universities across Canada competed in academics, sports and team spirit competitions.
The theme for the MBA Games 2025 was Digital Equity: Closing the Chasm which explored practical solutions to enhance digital equity through equal accessibility, innovation, participation and developing sustainable and secure digital ecosystems.
This year’s academic portion of the competition consisted of case comps where participants were tasked with pitching business ideas to charity partners, while the athletics competition included basketball, dodgeball and corn hole. The spirit competition comprised of a creative opening performance, an introduction video for all team members and a social media challenge to create awareness and to network.
Captain of the Asper team Oluwagbotemi Dada organized fundraising events that were held as part of the competition to raise money for their charity partner Canada Learning Code — a non-profit aiming to bridge the digital gap by creating technological awareness for minorities who are financially restricted from attending school.
Dada expressed that one of the team’s biggest challenges was raising money for the fundraiser.
“When you ask people to turn in money, even if it’s for a cause, you kind of have to explain, especially also because Canada Learning Code is not as popular,” she said.
Dada shared her excitement, stating how unexpected the third place win was for her due to all the setbacks her team had experienced, particularly in the basketball athletics competition.
Dada also reflected on how rewarding it felt to place third overall. She highlighted how they were also one of the smallest teams.
“It’s like we did more with less,” she said.
She felt that the team’s dedication to the late-night meetings, the feedback and early practices contributed greatly to their achievement. She valued the personal growth with her leadership role and lessons she has learned from her team.
“Just learning how to handle leadership in real time, that’s one of the biggest lessons,” said Dada.
The Asper team consisted of 15 members including Dada, Tianshi Zhang, Shivam Patel, Shobhit Saxena, Tony Wu, Shane Thiessen, Tapiwa Mushayakarara, Bill Heard, Sharib Jalis, Bamibo Isichei, Sravani Kalva, Dharmanshu Poshiya, Yaamini Rajan, Shernetta Davis and Gesudraz Ataullah.
The team’s coaches included Sean MacDonald, Lukas Neville, Eli Ouimet, Derek Johannson, Divya Ramachandran, Stephanie Toews, Vanessa Mancini and Paul Provost.
