The world lost a basketball hero this week -- and we're not talking about Michael Jordan.

You may not know her name, but Noella "Babe" MacLean, who died this week at age 87, was one of Canada's biggest sports stars. She was a member of the "winningest" basketball team Canada ever had. But unlike retired millionaire Jordan, Babe never made a cent for her skills .

Her team was known as the Edmonton Grads. None of the members of the team expected to do as well as they did. They were just a group of young women from the same school who liked to play basketball.

Their coach was teacher J. Percy Page, who later became the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta. Their home base was McDougall Commercial High School in Edmonton. For 25 years -- from 1915 to 1940 -- they brought great honour to Canada and their home city , Edmonton.

When they finally retired, the Grads had 108 championships to their credit. They won at all levels--local, regional, national, international and world.

Of the 522 games they played they won 502! The inventor of the game of basketball, Dr. James Naismith called the Edmonton Grads ``the finest basketball team that ever stepped out on a floor''.

Babe Belanger played with the Grads from 1929 to 1937. She was a forward and she stood only 5 feet, 2 inches tall. In those days, marriage meant an end to a young women's career. Babe Belanger married Ian MacLean, who continued the family sports tradition. He later became a trainer for Edmonton hockey teams and the Edmonton Eskimos and B.C. Lions football teams.

Babe never talked about her fabulous career. But her daughter says the scrapbooks she found in the family's basement show she was a part of a team that was every bit as sensational as the Edmonton Oilers in Gretzky's time.

2. Who played with the Grads from 1929 to 1937?