Alison Louise Lang was born in Saskatoon in 1961 and was active in sports at an early age, including swimming with the Saskatoon Y-Knots Club.

Alison was a natural at basketball and was on the senior girls' team at Walter Murray at the age of 15. She played for Walter Murray for four years and the girls always had a winning record. She competed in high jump while at Walter Murray, finishing second in the 1977 city meet. She also played volleyball with Walter Murray. She also played a season with Harmony Centre senior women's basketball team at the age of 17.

After qualifying on the national teams, Alison played basketball for Canada in the Pan-American junior championships in 1978, the Pan-American Games in 1979 and the world championships in 1979.

She enrolled at the University of Oregon in 1980, became Oregon's most prolific scorer of all time with 2,252 points and the second-best rebounder of all time with 1,151 rebounds. She started all 117 games of her career and owns 11 school records. She was twice voted All-American and helped Oregon reach three post-season national tournaments.

Alison played for Canada in the 1981 World University Games and the 1983 Pan-American Games. She faced seven-foot Chinese girls in the 1984 Olympic Games at Los Angeles where Canada had a fourth-place finish. During her world travels, one of her trips took her to the 1981 Gold Cup tournament and a visit to the Great Wall of China.

After her stint at the Olympics, Alison went to play professionally in Italy for a year.