Sporting Madness

York Lions head coach Warren Craney made two interesting hires today , picking Michael Faulds as the team's new offensive coordinator and Eric Laflamme as their new defensive coordinator. Although it's his first coaching job at the CIS level, Faulds needs no introduction to CIS football fans; he finished up a stellar quarterbacking career at Western last year and holds the CIS all-time passing record with 10,811 career yards. He led the Mustangs to back-to-back Yates Cups in 2007 and 2008, took them to the 2008 Vanier Cup, where they fell to Laval, and brought them back to the Yates this past year, where they lost to Queen's. He also played for Team Canada at the Global Junior Championships. There was some talk that a CFL team might consider giving him a shot, but nothing seemed to materialize. This move would suggest that Faulds' playing career is at an end. His CIS coaching career may just be beginning, but Faulds already has some experience in the field. He has ...

In a few short months, the Waterloo doping scandal has gone from an investigation of one player to a team-wide investigation to league-wide concerns over drug testing. Today saw the first tangible impact on a league-wide scale, though; as Sean Fitz-Gerald of The Canadian Press reports , Waterloo has suspended its football program for the coming year. The coaching staff has been placed on paid administrative leave. I'll get into analysis on this later, and I believe Rob Pettapiece has a post coming at The CIS Blog as well, but for now, let's focus on the facts. As Mark Masters reports , Canadian Centre for Ethics In Sport (the organization that oversees CIS drug testing) president Paul Melia announced that nine anti-doping violations were found after tests of Waterloo's 62 football players. As Masters writes, CIS CEO Marg McGregor called it "the biggest doping situation in CIS history. "The results announced today illustrate that the CIS core value ...

Head coach Chris Oliver of the University of Windsor Lancers' men's basketball team had some interesting news in an e-mail release yesterday. Only a few weeks after deciding to stay at Windsor despite rumours of a move to McMaster, and earning a new contract in the process, Oliver has landed what should be one of the most intriguing exhibition matchups of this coming year; John Calipari 's University of Kentucky Wildcats. According to the release, the Wildcats will be coming north to Windsor from August 15-17, Sunday through Tuesday. They'll face the Lancers Sunday evening at 7 p.m., then face the University of Western Ontario Mustangs Monday night at 6 p.m. and then play the Lancers again Tuesday morning at 11 a.m. All games will be played at the university's St. Denis Centre; ticket prices are $10 for adults and youth, $5 for children. Advance ticket information is expected to be released soon through the university's website . The Wildcats should be a ...

It's been a good couple of weeks for CIS football. After a strong showing by CIS prospects in the CFL draft, including first-overall pick Shomari Williams (who I interviewed before the draft), six CIS players appear in good shape to catch on with NFL teams. The Detroit Lions signed [ Sean Yuille , Pride Of Detroit ] Laurier defensive end Chima Ihekwoaba after their rookie minicamp [ Tom Kowalski , Mlive.com , via Ron Balaskovitz ], and Concordia linebacker Cory Greenwood signed with [ Mark Masters , National Post ] the Kansas City Chiefs today. Waterloo offensive lineman Joel Reinders has signed with Cleveland [ David Naylor , The Globe and Mail , Concordia offensive lineman Kristian Matte has inked a deal with Houston [ Herb Zurkowsky , The Gazette ], Bishop's wide receiver Shawn Gore reached an agreement with Green Bay [ Dave Heller , Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel ] and Regina wide receiver Jordan Sisco signed with the Indianapolis Colts [ Ian Hamilton , Regina Le...

I have a post up at The CIS Blog on Canada West's decision to add UBC-Okanagan, reject UNBC and VIU and make UFV and Thompson Rivers University permanent members. Might be worth a read for those interested in CIS issues; it's been a long process to get to this point, and it's still far from over.

The CFL draft is coming up [ Jaime Stein , CFL.ca ] this Sunday (noon Eastern, TSN). It's always an exciting time of the year, particularly from the perspective of watching CIS stars making the jump to the pros. To get you excited for it, here's an e-mail interview I just conducted with Shomari Williams , the Queen's defensive end who led the Gaels to the Vanier Cup this year and is ranked first overall by the CFL's scouting bureau. We talked about the CFL, CIS, the NCAA and his up-and-coming business helping recruits. My questions and his responses are below (slight edits for clarity). Andrew Bucholtz: You've made a pretty meteoric rise up the CFL Scouting Bureau rankings, from #15 at the start of last season to #4 in December to #1 earlier this year. Do you pay any attention to the rankings, and if so, what did it feel like to take over the top spot? Shomari Williams: It felt great being named the top prospect in Canada. I worked real hard all season and ...

There's an interesting piece from Ian Hamilton in the Regina Leader-Post today. Hamilton talks to Regina Rams head coach Frank McCrystal and comes away with a couple of valuable notes. First, he addresses the new Canada West schedule. In the wake of SFU's departure, the conference is down to six teams, which could provide an opportunity to balance the schedule for everyone. That's something McCrystal would like to see. "We put all this time and money and effort into the football program, so let's play more games," he told Hamilton. "We should be playing 10 games. We should be playing everybody twice." This might be worth looking at. Currently, the conference plays eight regular-season games, and that hasn't changed thanks to SFU's departure. At the moment, the Rams get Saskatchewan, Calgary and Manitoba twice each, face UBC on the road and host Alberta. I'm not sure if that's "easily the toughest schedule in the CIS"...

One of the side effects of SFU's decision to jump to NCAA Division II and UBC's subsequent decision to remain in CIS for the time being was the potential loss of CIS football's most storied games, the annual Shrum Bowl between the two teams. The Shrum Bowl has been contested 32 times over the years and always gets a fair bit of attention; everyone in the Lower Mainland knows about the UBC-SFU rivalry, and the annual football game has been one of its best expressions. Fortunately, as Howard Tsumura of The Province reports , that's going to continue for at least this year. Oddly enough, SFU's switch to the NCAA both threatened and preserved this year's game. The two teams will no longer meet in Canada West competition, but the Clan's departure left Canada West with only six football teams and forced a conference-wide bye on the Oct. 8-10 weekend. During that bye, the game will be played under the Friday night lights at UBC's Thunderbird Stadium on Oct....

This is a little old, but I didn't get the time to do it before now, and I think it's still interesting. I've talked about the implications of national recruiting in CIS recently, and this fits right into that. A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a feature for the Langley Times on my old high school volleyball teammate Gabe deGroot, who led the Guelph Gryphons to the Ontario final (where they lost a five-set thriller to Queen's). deGroot's story is interesting from a couple of perspectives. For one thing, he went from high school volleyball at a small AA school in B.C. (Fraser Valley Christian) to playing for The King's University College in the Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference to spending the last two years with Guelph. For another, he made the transition to CIS volleyball very smoothly, claiming the OUA libero of the year award in both seasons he played with the Gryphons. That's even more impressive when you consider that he changed positions midway thro...

It's nice to see CFL teams actually giving Canadian (and CIS!) quarterbacks a look for once. Shortly after the Hamilton Tiger-Cats added Erik Glavic (of Saint Mary's Huskies and Calgary Dinos fame) to their negotiating list, the Toronto Argonauts announced that they'd signed Queen's Vanier Cup-winning quarterback Danny Brannagan . There's a good piece from Chris Zelkovich in today's Toronto Star on the matter, talking to both Brannagan and Glavic about their invites to the CFL's evaluation camp this past weekend and the proposal that would allow teams to bring a Canadian QB to camp without taking up a roster spot. Of course, this is very early, and there's no guarantee that any of these Canadian quarterbacks will actually get a shot to prove that they belong. Still, progress is always good, and you have to start somewhere. Maybe this can be one of the first steps towards a real evaluation of quarterbacks based on their skills , rather than national...

This one's for all the marbles. It's an all-Canada West final at the CIS men's volleyball championships here in Kamloops, with the Trinity Western Spartans taking on the Calgary Dinos. Join me in the live blog below! Trinity Western - Calgary (gold medal)

It's the first game of the medal round at the CIS volleyball nationals in Kamloops, featuring the No.2 seed Alberta Golden Bears and the No.1 seed Laval Rouge et Or. The game can be seen at SSN Canada . Join in the live blog below! Alberta - Laval (bronze medal)

The first action of the day at the CIS men's volleyball tournament sees Queen's taking on the hometown Thompson Rivers WolfPack in the fifth-place game. Join in the live blog below! Queen's - Thompson Rivers

That has to be one of the most exciting volleyball games I've ever seen. Both teams came out slugging early, but Laval looked to have the upper hand when they won a close third set 25-23 to take a 2-1 lead. Trinity Western refused to quit, though, winning the last two sets to advance to the final. The final set, which ended 20-18 in favour of the Spartans, could have gone either way, but in the end, they did enough to hang on. Steven Marshall had a tremendous night for the Spartans, finishing with 25 kills. He said the whole team took their game to a new level. "It was amazing," he said. "It was the best game we’ve had this season. I think we played as a team, as a whole. We helped each other all game." Trinity Western demonstrated a great deal of depth; Marshall and Rudy Verhoeff (11 kills, 10 blocks) were both huge in the Spartans' comeback, with other players like Marc Howatson (16 kills) and Josh Doornenbal (9 kills) coming up big when call...

In an all-Alberta matchup, the University of Alberta Golden Bears will take on the University of Calgary Dinos in tonight's late semi-final. The winner will go on to face Trinity Western in tomorrow's gold-medal game, with the loser taking on Laval for third place. Watch the game on SSN and join in the live blog below! Battle of Alberta

It's the first semifinal of the CIS men's volleyball championships, featuring the fourth-seeded Trinity Western Spartans and the top-ranked Laval Rouge et Or. Catch the webcast at SSN Canada and join the live blog below! Laval - Trinity Western

Earlier this week, I wrote a long piece about how the increased availability of athletic entrance scholarships and the increased focus on national recruiting has started to help schools outside of Canada West start to catch up in sports traditionally dominated by western teams. Canada West does still have some edges in scholarships, infrastructure and coaches, but I think the gap is beginning to close a bit. However, you wouldn't know it from this weekend's CIS volleyball national championships. As I wrote in a feature for the Queen's Journal back in 2008, men's volleyball has been solidly dominated by Canada West since its inception, with the conference claiming the last 15 straight national titles and 37 of the 43 championships that have been held. That pattern hasn't shown any signs of changing so far; there are four Canada West teams here, making up half the field; No. 2 Alberta, No. 4 Trinity Western, No. 6 Calgary and No. 7 Thompson Rivers. Three of the f...

It's the second consolation final at the CIS men's volleyball championships in Kamloops, featuring the hometown Thompson Rivers WolfPack against the Dalhousie Tigers. Winner plays Queen's for fifth tomorrow; loser's tournament ends here. Join me in the live blog below. This will be a little more infrequently updated than some of the others, as I'm working on some other posts as well, but I should still have regular score and action updates. Thompson Rivers - Dalhousie

I was paging through the Dalhousie Tigers' media guide earlier and came across quite an interesting stat. The Tigers have appeared at 31 straight CIS championships. They've won 24 straight Atlantic University Sport championships and 30 of the last 31 (presumably, their other appearance came either when they were hosting or when the AUS wound up with two spots). Current head coach Dan Ota has been there for 11 years and won 11 straight AUS championships; he's also been named AUS coach of the year nine times in that span. Clearly, AUS volleyball is Dalhousie and everyone else. The question, though, is if that dominance is a good thing or a bad thing for the program. On the plus side, that probably gives them first crack at any Maritime recruits who want to stay in the region. Their almost-guaranteed spot at nationals also can be a significant recruiting advantage, allowing them to draw more national recruits than they probably would otherwise; only three players on the cur...

The next game in the CIS men's volleyball championships sees the hometown Thompson Rivers WolfPack, seeded seventh, taking on the Canada West champion Alberta Golden Bears, seeded first. It should be an interesting one. Tune in on SSN Canada and join in the live blog below! Thompson Rivers - Alberta