Jan Trojanowski

Jan Trojanowski rose from humble beginnings to, by the end of his Acadia career, rank as one of the greatest of Axemen basketball players. 

Born in South Africa in 1977, Jan’s family moved around a lot as he was growing up. When he entered Acadia in the fall of 1994, though still only 17, Jan stood 6’7”, and he showed enough raw talent and potential for Axemen head coach Dave Nutbrown to promise him he wouldn’t be cut from the team. 

In his first year at Acadia, Jan got into two games and didn’t score. In 1995-1996, he dressed for 19 games and averaged 8.8 points and 4.4 rebounds per game. The Axemen made it to the CIAU Final Eight as a wildcard selection and ended up fifth in the country. He continued to improve in his third year, raising his scoring average to 12.1 and his rebounds to 6.2 per game.  

Jan really came into his own in 1997-1998, averaging 18.8 points and 9.2 rebounds per game and leading the Axemen to the conference championship. He was voted the conference Most Valuable Player and a first-team AUS All-Star and was chosen a first-team All-Canadian. He also was the AUS nominee for the Howard Mackie Award as the CIAU Player of the Year. The Axemen again ended up fifth in the country. 

Jan graduated in 1998, but as he was still only 21 years old, it wasn’t that tough a decision to return for a fifth season. He made his final season with the Axemen his best, averaging a career high 22.1 points and 10.5 rebounds per game. He repeated as AUS Most Valuable Player, a first-team conference All-Star and a first team all-Canadian. 

Jan completed his university career having scored 1,229 points in 81 games for a 15.2 points per game average – coincidentally, the same career average as fellow 2023 inductee Peter Morris. He converted 62.7 per cent of his field goal attempts, averaged 7.4 rebounds per game and had 76 career steals. A perennial Academic All-Canadian, in 1999, he was honoured as a CIAU Top-8 Academic All-Canadian.  

After leaving Acadia, Jan played two seasons of professional basketball in Europe. He also got into endurance events, racing triathlons at the Ironman distance and running marathons. 

Jan enrolled at Dalhousie Medical School and after graduation, trained as a doctor across Canada and in Australia and the UK. He currently lives in Vancouver, working in Emergency Medicine, Critical Care and Prehospital and Transport Medicine.  

Coach Nutbrown said in 2013 that he took great satisfaction in how much Jan had improved over the course of his Acadia career. He felt much of Jan’s success was due to his superior work ethic. “He was extremely bright,” both as an honours student and as a basketball player, “and no one was more determined than Jan.” On the basketball court, by his final two years, it usually took two opponents to guard him. “One was never enough.”