Sporting Madness

Thanks to Mike Grobe of Queen's Athletics, I came across the 3 minute clip highlighting the Queen's-RMC rivalry that aired on CBC Saturday during their Hockey Day in Canada coverage. It's pretty good; some creative camera shots of both universities, a bit of footage from the old-time reenactment and plenty of coverage from this year's Carr-Harris Cup , including pre-game speeches by Queen's head coach Brett Gibson and RMC head coach Adam Shell , as well as interviews with the likes of Gibson, Paul Bradley , Grant Horvath , Bill Fitsell and David Carr-Harris . You can find it at http://www.cbc.ca/sports/ondemand/ by searching "RMC": only the right clip will show up that way. Unfortunately, I can't embed it or link to it directly, but it's still definitely worth a look. Kudos to CBC on a job well done on this segment, especially without a lot of airtime to work with.

It should be a classic clash tonight between Queen's and RMC for Kingston CIS hockey supremacy. More than just bragging rights is on the line, though; the winner takes home the Carr-Harris Cup, and the Gaels likely need two points to keep their playoff hopes alive. Currently, they're tied with the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees for the final OUA East playoff berth, but Ottawa has two games in hand. Join me in the live blog below for all the action! Queen's hockey: the Carr-Harris Cup!

A quick note that I'll be live-blogging Queen's men's hockey games here both Friday and Saturday. The Gaels face 4-20-1 Ryerson Friday night and then take on 7-16-2 RMC Saturday in the annual Carr-Harris Cup. Both games are at 7:30 p.m. at the Memorial Centre, and both are likely to prove rather important for the OUA playoff picture. Queen's (10-13-2) is one point behind Ottawa for the final OUA East playoff spot. We'll see if interim captain Billy Burke can continue his streak; he's notched 2 goals in each of the last three games. Check tomorrow's Journal for a piece by Julie Stewart-Binks on Tuesday's win over Carleton and a profile of Burke by Anand Srivastava , and then come join the live blog tomorrow night!

Breaking down the men's hockey team's shootout win over the Royal Military College Paladins in Friday night's Lou Jeffries memorial exhibition game... (abbreviated because I have to get up rather bloody early tomorrow today to journey to the Centre of the Universe and cover the football game against U of T, which will be live-blogged here as mentioned previously)... The score: Queen's 3, RMC 3 (Queen's wins 3-2 in a shootout) How I saw it: In person, which meant a bus trip out to Gananoque with the team and sitting around the arena for a couple hours beforehand. It was a great game, though, and worth the time invested. The Good: -Queen's physical play: You could tell right from the start that the Gaels weren't taking this one lightly, appropriate considering that it was against hated rivals RMC. Defencemen Francis Horvath and Marcus Halcro in particular established a physical presence from the opening puck drop with some big hits. -Pat Doyle: The fi...

A quick note that I'll hopefully be live-blogging tonight's men's hockey exhibition game between Queen's and the RMC Paladins. It's out in Gananoque, and I don't know if they have Internet connections in their press box, but if they do, There Will Be Blog (of the live variety). Puck-drop is set for 7 p.m. Tomorrow, I'm taking the fan bus to Toronto to cover the football game between Queen's and the Varsity Blues, and I've been assured their press box is fully connected, so you can count on a live blog of that game here (barring unforeseen complications). I'll hopefully have a preview of the football game up either later tonight or first thing in the morning before I leave. Kick-off is at 1 p.m. If anyone reading this will be on the fan bus or at the pre-game party, feel free to say hi! I should be easy to recognize, as it's doubtful that there will be too many mustached guys wearing ties and carrying laptops...

I watched a great match over at RMC's Constantine Arena tonight between the Gaels and the Paladins. As previously mentioned , RMC's arena is far too small for these sorts of games: fans were crammed into the rink in sardine-esque fashion, including those of us from the Journal : the press box was overflowing (Mike and I, Brock Harrison from the Whig-Standard and the CFRC guys broadcasting the game were all forced into regular seats). As this was the last regular-season game between Queen's and RMC, the Carr-Harris Cup (named after a prominent local family who had members play for both teams) was up for grabs, which meant even more people wanted to come to the game. I don't think the arena could have taken any more, though: all the seats were long gone by puck drop, and students lined the standing-room area around the glass as well. On the plus side, there was a great crowd and atmosphere: both the Queen's and RMC bands were out in force, along with students from...

In the final installment of Campus Corner for this week, here's my thoughts on the hockey teams. First, the men's team pulled off a very nice come-from-behind victory against RMC on Wednesday: the Journal was well-represented at the match, with Mike, Josh and myself all making the cross-town trip to Constantine Arena. I mentioned in a comment on Neate's blog earlier that I wasn't too impressed with the arena: to me, it felt way too small and cramped (the section we were sitting in was packed to the brim, and there were constantly people moving around looking for seats). Also, the penalty boxes weren't glassed in, which I haven't seen in a hockey rink before, and the whole arena's covered by white netting, making visibility pretty limited. Others think differently, though. Anyways, on the game itself: it was a pretty impressive performance from the Gaels. What amazed me the most was one particular coaching decision on the part of Brett Gibson. Pat Doyle was ...

The men's basketball team faces a sharp contrast this weekend. Tonight, they play 14-0 Carleton, the consensus No.1 team in the country (according to the CIS poll, cishoops.ca , and the RPI rankings , which agree on very little apart from Carleton). Tomorrow night, they play a polar opposite team in the 0-14 RMC Paladins (as an aside, why does RMC even bother keeping volleyball and basketball teams? They haven't won a game in either gender in either sport this year, so they're worse than the Miami Dolphins, which is pretty sad). Tonight's Carleton game should be quite interesting. As Neate Sager noted on The CIS Blog , Carleton's suffering from a flu bug . That, combined with the possibility that the Ravens might overlook tonight's match in preparation for tomorrow's Capital Hoops Classic against Ottawa before 10,000 fans at Scotiabank Place, should at least give the Gaels a slim chance to my way of thinking. Unfortunately, head coach Rob Smart doesn't...