Latest news with #U Sports
CTV News
3 days ago
- Sport
- CTV News
Golden Hawks football back after storied 2024 season
CTV's Colton Weins has a preview of what's the come this season after last year's champion run. The Wilfrid Laurier University Golden Hawks football team hosted a controlled scrimmage with the York Lions on Friday, as they look ahead to the upcoming season. It's been about nine months since Laurier played in the national U Sports football championship and excitement was especially high. 'It's August again so Football season is right around the corner, so I just can't wait,' Jesulayomi Ojutalayo, fourth year wide receiver for the Golden Hawks, said. golden hawks 2025 Wilfrid Laurier and York University at a controlled scrimmage at University Stadium Aug. 15, 2025. (CTV News/Colton Wiens) The Golden Hawks' last season was one to remember. The team went undefeated through 11 games and came up just short in the national final. 'You have a nine month off season. And we have the shortest off season of all, having played in the Vanier Cup. And it's still a long time in the weight room, in the meeting rooms and no games. So the fact that training camps here, we're having a joint practice and scrimmage against York today and then our season opener at Guelph next Saturday, there's a lot of excitement around the program,' Michael Faulds, head coach of the Golden Hawks, said. Faulds has been telling players since January not to think of all of last years success, but instead that every season is new, with new players and in need of a new identity. 'So we know last year put a target on our back. So we're going to get everyone's best. But we've got a very mature group, a very talented group that knows we're going to have to earn everything,' Faulds said. One position with a lot of questions this season is who takes over for star quarterback Taylor Elgersma -- who's now with the NFL's Green Bay Packers. 'We've got five quarterbacks in house, all working really hard and like a lot of other positions, we're asking everyone to compete. We haven't solidified starters anywhere. But that's a good problem to have as coaches that you have a lot of guys competing, a lot of guys that want to dress and play,' Faulds said. Faulds doesn't expect anyone to fill Elgersma's shoes, but feels the depth of their roster will take a lot of pressure off whoever earns the job. 'Just be themselves, play mistake free football and try to win football games,' Faulds said. Despite not knowing their starter, leaders that are still in the lineup say the team's recent success has made a big impact on the program. 'I see definitely a culture change within the community, the guys have all bought into the process, which Coach Faulds has laid out for us. So, just trusting him every single day,' Ojutalayo said. 'I think recruits look at this as a destination where you can win a lot of football games, where you can be seen on the national stage, but it also means for recruits, which isn't easy for them to realize that you're probably going to have to be a developmental player before starting,' Faulds said. Ojutalayo is from Shelburne, Ont. He is in his fourth year of U Sports eligibility and in his fifth year of schooling at Laurier. He's graduating with a major in economics, and a minor in geography and leadership. It is also his pro draft year, and he spent the summer in Waterloo working for a window cleaning sales company. 'When I decided to leave home and committed to the Laurier Golden Hawks, I made a plan to myself that I'm going to do whatever it is to make sure I have the most development I can, and that includes staying in the summer,' Ojutalayo said. The Golden Hawks will start to solidify their starting lineup in the coming days and are set to kickoff the regular season on Aug. 23, against the Gryphons, at the University of Guelph.
Yahoo
08-07-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Maxime Pellerin Commits To Nebraska Omaha
Jason Wachter, jwachter@ Former McGill forward Maxime Pellerin has committed to Nebraska Omaha, it was announced late last week. Hailing from Victoriaville, Que., Pellerin spent this past season playing for the Redbirds, scoring 10 goals and adding 15 assists for 25 points in 26 regular season games. With McGill having made the playoffs, Pellerin put up four goals and five points in five games. Advertisement Prior to making his way to U Sports, Pellerin spent five seasons playing in the QMJHL with the Victoriaville Tigres. Over 282 career regular season games, Pellerin collected 110 goals and 128 assists for 238 points. Pellerin grew up playing his minor hockey for College Claretain and the Trois-Rivieres Estacades. With Pellerin making the jump to the NCAA, he joins a flurry of U Sports talent making the jump to the Mavericks. While the majority of the commits come from Western Canada, Pellerin proved he's a difference maker in U Sports and should do the same as he makes the jump to Div. I.
CBC
14-06-2025
- Sport
- CBC
What happens when athletes' dreams of going pro are crushed? Filmmaker studying UVic team aims to find out
Raymond Dimmitt arrived in B.C. in 2019 with big dreams. Having just turned 18, he'd moved away from the United Arab Emirates, where he grew up, to Vancouver Island. He was poised to study at the University of Victoria, an eager freshman with a history of playing high level basketball back home. He planned to play for the University of Victoria's men's basketball team, where he figured he'd train and prepare for a career with the national team in Thailand, where he was born. But Dimmitt said he was "quickly humbled" when he didn't make the team. "It was a very eye-opening experience to realize how much better the level of basketball is here in Canada," he said. "It was hard for me that I had to go back to the drawing board and figure out what I'm going to do with my life." Now, five years later, with a degree in philosophy and environmental studies and some film directing credits on his resume, Dimmitts is using his lived experience to make a documentary about the fallout when athletes, in particular, find out life might not work out the way they'd planned. "My focus in school was philosophy, and I feel like now it's my chance to kind of tell the story that's not being told enough in this existential nature of what it means to be an athlete," he said. Dimmitt and a small film crew will follow the University of Victoria men's soccer team for the next two seasons, culminating in their journey to the U Sports Men's Soccer Championship in 2027, which the university is hosting. "Soccer especially, it is an incredibly challenging sport to make it professional," Dimmitt said. Dimmitt made it clear he doesn't want or expect the team to fail but, according to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), very few student athletes go on to professional sports careers. "I think some of them will have to grapple with this nature, that this reality may not be in the books for them, but also some will," he said. "But maybe in this process, if we succeed properly, we're able to exemplify how it's OK for the next generation of athletes to watch this and be feeling a little bit less worried about a future that doesn't involve sport." Coming to terms with that reality is completely normal, according to performance psychology consultant Roger Friesen. Friesen, who works with some of Canada's top athletes, including national teams qualifying for the Olympics, said how people react and come to terms with that feeling varies. "Disappointment and confusion is probably going to be a very real thing," he said from his home on B.C.'s Quadra Island. "Often people's identities are wrapped up in that dream." Universal experience It's something that can be applied to anything in life, Friesen said: sports, music, getting a certain job, having a family, living a certain way — life doesn't always work out the way we plan. Learning how to be "mentally robust" and manage change are important parts of what he does when working with athletes. Friesen said course correction is another area he focuses on. When one thing doesn't work out, such as athletics, for example, it's important to know what our other abilities and interests are to help us move forward, he said. It's that common experience of coming to terms with not succeeding in the way we had planned that Dimmitt hopes will get people watching the film and talking about it. "If this isn't the most relatable topic, I don't know what it is," he said. Dimmitt said he doesn't yet know when the film will be finished, but that he hopes people who view it feel seen. "If someone in the audience watching, whether an ex-athlete or an ex-musician who wanted to go pro or be very famous or whatever, if they're able to watch this documentary and feel a little bit more understood that a dream they once had was not able to fulfill itself, and that's OK, if you're seen through it, I'd be on top of the world."
