CIS CORNER: IT'S LAVAL-SASKATCHEWAN IN THE VANIER CUP... AGAIN

This is the moment we feared, people. Many of you thought it would never happen, but I insisted we spend two hours every morning training for it. You all thought I was mad. Many of you requested to be transfered to another peanut factory. But now..

... We, the CIS football cognoscenti are getting the dreaded Laval-Saskatchewan Vanier Cup. We've been windmill-tilting since August, touting Concordia, Manitoba, Montreal -- even Alberta -- but the odds-on likely matchup is here.


U OF S HUSKIES 35 OTTAWA GEE-GEES 28: Without Joseph Woldu picking off Joshua Sacobie late in the third quarter and returning it 78 yards for a touchdown, Brian Towriss' Huskies would be signing up to sell 50/50 tickets next week at a Laval-Ottawa Vanier Cup.

Even before that point, with Ottawa 21-10, this had the ingredients of a stomach punch game (in Bill Simmons' phrase) for the Gee-Gees and their fans. Sacobie piled up more than 200 passing yards in the first half, and that only led to a 14-10 lead. Ara Tchobanian had a missed field goal go for a single and both Huskies' first-half scores came off turnovers, so that was a 12-point swing right there. Ottawa was driving again, having just gone up by 11, when Woldu made the game-turning pick.

Considering QB Bret Thompson threw for just 84 yards with no TDs and two interceptions, 28-10 with 20 minutes left in the game would probably have proved insurmountable. Instead, it was Tyler O'Gorman off the left side again, and again (and again and again), and the Huskies fought back.

If you're backing Saskatchewan in the Vanier Cup (3 p.m. Saturday, The Score/RDS), you can probably point to their offensive line and the character they showed today, plus the home-field advantage they'll have. Still, receiver Cory Jones came out with an injury, and tailback Scott Stevens sat out. Both would help a lot against Laval. Bear in mind, no Can West team has lost a national playoff game since 1968, when Queen's beat Manitoba in a national semi-final.

Too bad for coach Denis Piché's Gee-Gees. Ottawa could be back next year, although it's losing fifth-year players in receiver Jean-Phillipe Asselin, d-back Anthony Plante-Ajah and O-linemen Naim El-Far and Peter Hogarth, among others.

LAVAL ROUGE ET OR 57 ACADIA AXEMEN 10: Before anyone starts talking about Laval being too dominant, remember this wasn't even the biggest bowl blowout even in the last five years -- Saint Mary's trounced Simon Fraser by 51 points in the '03 Uteck, and some of the Atlantic Bowls back in the '80s were real doozies.

It was a game for about three or four series, and then Laval's superiority just asserted itself. It started with LB Eric Maranda distracting Acadia's Cale Inglis and causing a fumble, which set up a Cameron Takacs field goal. Moments later, Olivier Turcotte-Létourneau returned the first of his team's five interceptions 58 yards for a touchdown, and it was officially a rout once Laval answered an Acadia touchdown drive with one of its own to go up 19-7.

It got to the point that Laval coach Glenn Constantin apparently even felt compelled to go to Acadia's bench and make sure they weren't bent out of shape by the Rouge et Or punting when they were in field-goal range.

For the Vanier, Laval backers can play up their speed in almost all areas and run-pass balance on offence, especially since they have the more consistent QB in Benoît Groulx.

OTHER CIS NOTES

• Couple days late on this, but you might remember Jordan Smith, the one-time second-round pick of the Anaheim Ducks who lost the sight in his left eye last Feb. 24 when he was hit with a puck while playing for Portland in the AHL. Smith has signed on to play CIS hockey with the Lakehead Thunderwolves, one of the country's top teams. He's slated to begin playing Jan. 5, when the Thunder Bay school travels south for a two-game series with Windsor. Two weeks after that, Lakehead is in southern Ontario again for games with Waterloo and Western, so Smith might have to do the whole media thing then.
• Quick hoops note: Jean-Emmanuel Jean-Marie had 24 points in just 23 minutes of floor time to help the Carleton Ravens beat Guelph 76-69 to improve to 4-0 in OUA play. The Ottawa Gee-Gees also won twice this weekend, with five players scoring in double figures in an 87-72 win over nationally ranked Brock last night. Curtis Shakespeare had a team-high 19 points for the U of O.

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.