Farah Bastien

Worth knowing

She has stood up data science and engineering teams from scratch inside one of the country's largest sports organizations, hiring research scientists and data engineers into roles that did not exist there before, and shipped AI and computer vision work on athlete biomechanics and performance. She also knows how to take a sports product from launch to app stores.

Story

Farah studied physics and then math before a Master's in Management Analytics at Queen's, and in her early twenties she volunteered as a civilian instructor and glider pilot with the Royal Canadian Air Cadets at the Greater Toronto Gliding Centre. She joined MLSE as a data science manager and rose to lead teams of more than 30 across the Raptors, Maple Leafs, TFC and Argonauts, writing on AI in sport for CIOReview along the way. She has also led data strategy at Canadian Tire Jumpstart Charities and taught sports analytics to University of Toronto undergraduates. Today she runs Watch Her Win from Toronto, publishing a weekly women's sports schedule newsletter and bringing the platform to iOS and Android.

Canadian story

I moved to Canada from Bangladesh at 14, in love with sports. My parents backed that, and my love of flying, which led me to physics and then math. Ten years later I landed my dream job at MLSE (Maple Leafs, Raptors), leading digital, AI, data science and data engineering, and founding SportsX with AWS, Canada’s first sports lab inside a pro team. Today I live that dream louder and prouder: I lead analytics for the Northern Super League and run Watch Her Win, the world’s first women’s sports discovery platform. We launched in March 2025, and our iOS and Android apps arrive this November.

Highlights

• Founder, SportsX, the AWS-built innovation lab inside MLSE
• WXN Canada's Top 100 Most Powerful Women, Amex Emerging Leaders (2023)
• Director, R&D & Digital, MLSE
• MMA, Queen's University (2016)