Ottawa footy phenom Donzo takes another step

It's a thrill to be to pass along news Abraham Donzo, a teenaged Ottawa soccer player, has earned a "3-month invitation with Everton’s academy in the hopes of landing a professional contract."

It's pretty tough to do justice to the story of Abraham Donzo, but it was a honour to have been able to take a stab at it a month ago. Sportswriters are not supposed to cheerlead, but having been let in on what he's gone through and how he and his Canadian parents Phil and Sue Roberts have made it work, well, I defy you not to cheer for him.

Oct. 8, 2009

Not just in it for kicks
Soccer prodigy hopes long journey leads to pro deal

Abraham Donzo is as tough to label as he is to mark on the pitch.

That's a way to relate how far and fast the footy prodigy has come since arriving in Ottawa in 2005 from a refugee camp in Liberia. The label doesn't stick. It's there, but the only mention of pain that comes up while talking to Donzo relates to rehabbing his right knee after he tore an ACL in May 2008.

He's a well-adjusted 16-year-old Colonel By student, supported by loving parents, educators Sue and Phil Roberts. The hook is he is jetting across the Atlantic next Wednesday for a fourth trial with Everton FC of the English Premier League.

"My journey started kind of sad, but now it's going in a good way," says Donzo, who starred with the Ontario provincial team this summer, scoring all of its goals in 5-of-6 games at nationals.

"When I was leaving my family in Liberia I was sad, but they wanted me to come here, to have a chance at a future, so I was happy they did that."

The ACL injury meant Donzo was not 100% match-fit the last time he was at Everton. Getting into an EPL team's academy is as vital for a 16-year-old footballer as the NHL draft is for a teen hockey player. Ottawa Fury president John Pugh notes, "this is the probably the time" that Everton will decide whether to add Donzo to its academy. He'll likely find out in January.

"I know this is my last chance with Everton," the 5-foot-11, 160-lb. striker says. "I feel good, skill-wise. The only thing I am worried about is the physical play. They're big guys and they're tough."

REALITY SHOW WINNER

You know about Donzo winning a reality show, Soccer Dreams, and catching Everton's eye. A bigger part of the backstory is the Roberts family. Donzo came to Canada with a male relative, Sekou Donzo. He eventually moved in with the Robertses, who are his legal guardians.

"They're always there for me," he says. "I was shy at first, but I get treated like a brother and I treat them (siblings Michelle, Amy and Meagan) like a sister."

His dad, who is the Ottawa Gee-Gees' special teams co-ordinator, might never forget the rush his spouse and daughters threw at him about adding Abraham to the brood.

"It just kind of fell into place," Phil Roberts says. "His uncle was working all the time and Abe is still in contact with him. Children's Aid approached us about him. They said to us, 'We've never done this, but he's doing well here in school, we don't want to have to switch.'

"When my daughters and wife cornered me about it, I went, 'Uh -oh, I'm not a young guy.' I was 49 years old at the time, we have three daughters, I'm coaching football all the time, coaching basketball at the high school. But within two weeks, I knew it was a good fit."

Roberts' contacts in the helmeted, hand-using version of football paid off when Donzo injured his knee. One of his former players, Western Mustangs assistant coach Mickey Donovan, helped connect them with Dr. Kevin Willits in London, Ont., for treatment. Willits also coaches at Western.

Of course, no one could rehab the knee for Donzo.

"He was ready to go after 4 1/2 months," Roberts says. "I'm a football guy, and I was just amazed. He was waking up at 6 a.m., icing it six times a day ... I know university, pro guys who couldn't do what he did."

What happens at Everton is not necessarily make-or-break. There are a lot of football teams.

When you go in there for a two-week trial, you've got to be better than what they've had in the academy," explains Steve Hill, Donzo's coach with the Ottawa Fury. "You can't be as good as, because they have people who have been there since the age of eight, nine, 10 years old, whom they've worked with 3-4 years. It's a bit cutthroat."

That's the kicker. The hard part is still ahead for Donzo, after leaving family, after the culture shock, after blowing out a knee. Is it in him?

"I'm not the kind of person who gives up," he says.

OUA football: Ottawa-Laurier liveblog

1 p.m. Saturday, hope to see you!

CIS Corner: Ravens confirm St. John's game

Confirming an earlier report, the defending CIS men's basketball champion Carleton Ravens will face a Big East team in September, the St. John's Red Storm.

The game is Sept. 6, the Sunday of Labour Day weekend, but at the Ravens' Nest rather than Scotiabank Place, which is booked for an Aerosmith concert that weekend. Presumably, St. John's will also play the Ottawa Gee-Gees while in the capital.

It's a downer not to have games at SBP, but ultimately a big arena rock band is a better seller than basketball in Ottawa, even if Aerosmith is a couple decades past its best-before date. (If you were ever in doubt about Ottawa's musical tastes, last week KISS drew a crowd of 30,000 and Green Day got 8,000. KISS wasn't even good when they were the same age as the members of Green Day.)

The Red Storm were 16-18 last season, but are considered a "veteran team" (New York Daily News). In terms of hoops celebrity, one of their main forwards is 6-foot-7 Anthony Mason Jr., son of the former New York Knicks player. Mason is coming off an ankle injury and St. John's coach Norm Roberts noted the Canada trip will give him a chance to get back to game speed, so hopefully he would play extended minutes.

Carleton has a history with the Big East. They hosted Villanova, which went to the Final Four last season, at the start of 2007-08. They also took Rick Pitino's Louisville Cardinals to overtime in September 2006 and if memory serves, both they and the Gee-Gees have travelled south to play Cincinnati.

Carleton's release also confirmed a game on Aug. 18 vs. the Towson Tigers, as also previously noted. The Tigers will play a Ravens alumni team on Aug. 17, face the Ottawa Gee-Gees that night and face the Ravens the following evening.

On the women's side, coach Taffe Charles' Ravens will host two D-1 teams, Fairleigh Dickinson and Vermont, on Aug. 27-28, both 8 p.m. tip-offs at the Ravens' Nest. The latter game should be a homecoming for Vermont senior guard Courtnay Pilypaitis, a St. Peter alumna who led the Catamounts to the America East conference title and the NCAA Tournament last season. Vermont is also playing a game in Waterloo, since that's the hometown of another of their starters, May Kotsopoulos.

CIS Corner: Another Big East visitor

A couple notes on our teams of interest in The 613 ...

Big East teams seem to love coming to Ottawa.

Sources say the St. John's Red Storm will be coming to the nation's capital for one of the cross-border college basketball games around Labour Day weekend that have proven very popular.

St. John's is coming off a 16-18 season and a first-loss to Richmond in the CBI post-season tournament. The Red Storm would be the third team from their conference to come up in the past four years. Louisville came up in 2006 and Villanova visited in '07. There's no word yet about dates. Having the Ravens and Gee-Gees play a doubleheader at Scotiabank Place on Labour Day Saturday worked very well last season. However, Scotiabank Place is booked for an Aerosmith concert that weekend.

There is also talk that Carleton has a game arranged with the Towson Tigers from the Colonial Athletic Association. (All this author knows about Towson is that it was Elaine Benes' alma mater on Seinfeld.)

Also, the Toronto Raptors are coming for training camp. Doug Smith had it on his blog some time back:

"Oh yeah, did I tell you that we’re coming to Ottawa for sure for training camp next fall?"

C'est la vie for Ottawa sports coverage that there has not been a story in either daily. You would think someone on the Senators asked for a trade.

Mornings with Mr. Canoehead

Well I woke up Sunday morning, with no way to hold my head that didn't hurt. And the beer I had for breakfast wasn't bad, so I had one more for dessert ... here what's not bothering you now, raisins off an Oldsmobile.

... The new Yankee Stadium after Roy Halladay was done out of a win Saturday. It's understood that the Yankees honour their history, but turning Johnny Damon into Lou Gehrig is going too far. Between its ridiculous hitter-friendliness — Damon has already hit 12 home runs there, hey, lots of 35-year-olds just suddenly become power hitters — and the super-extendo seventh-inning stretch, it's borderline cheating. The latter actually comes from Mike Wilner:

" Speaking of the 7th inning, and I hate to bring this up since the idea of signing God Bless America in the 7th inning stretch, especially on the 4th of July, is a lovely thing, but seriously. Does it have to be the extended dance mix of the song, a Yankee Stadium tradition? I would love to go back over the last nine years and see how many runs the Yanks have scored at home in the 7th inning after freezing the opposing pitcher for an extra five minutes while Dr. Ronan Tynan dragged out every last syllable of GBA.

"And maybe it’s me, but I just find it to be the overwhelming Yankee arrogance that carries over into Tynan’s rendition, since he’s the only one on the planet who actually sings the whole thing. It's as though the thinking is 'this is New York City, we’re going to be the only ones who do it right.' It would be like the Blue Jays stopping home games in the 7th inning stretch to sing O Canada and making sure to include the mysterious second verse about great prairies spreading and mighty rivers flowing."

The new Yankee Stadium calls to mind the late, great Dan Quisenberry's line about another stadium, "I don't know if there are good uses for nuclear weapons, but this might be one."

... two players on a Double-A team driving in more runs last night than Vernon Wells has since the first of June. No, they were not playing a doubleheader.

... Dany Heatley thinking it's despicable Sarah Palin won't honour her commitment to the Alaska electorate. Incidentally, if Heatley is coming to Ottawa for teammate Jason Spezza's wedding, they might need to hold the reception at the U.S. embassy, for the extra security.

... the irony of minor-league hockey player Robin Gomez being acquitted of assault on the same day that his team, the Oklahoma City Blazers, went out of business.

(Former Ottawa Gee-Gees goalie Jordan Watt was one of Gomez's defence lawyer.

... the Toronto Argonauts running radio spots calling themselves an "accessible team." The B.C. Lions deserve that appellation after the way their offensive line blocked on Friday (nine sacks allowed vs. Saskatchewan).

... Team-hopping football coach Nick Saban playing himself in the film version of The Blind Side. Apparently he wandered off the set in the middle of the shoot to take a role in another movie.

... knowing why it is not socially acceptable to say Formula One's Bernie Ecclestone got roasted for praising Hitler. You would be almost as bad as he is.

... not knowing Tyler Arnason was still in the NHL.

CIS Corner: Losses hit Gaels hard; mulling the Ravens revival

Being on vacation last week precluded weighing in on a couple pertinent university football stories, the emerging details about a Carleton Ravens revival and Queen's losses to the CFL.

Ravens/Gee-Gees: Ottawa's WCE — whose turn is it to wear the mayor's chain of office this week? — could still screw this up. After last week, it is easier to picture a double launch in 2012, with the Ravens joining the Reconstituted.

CFL commissioner Mark Cohon said recently that Ottawa will come back into the pro league in 2012. Three years is enough lead time for Carleton to prepare the proper exploitation for a football revival.

Carleton would basically run on the Laval model, with the football team almost separate from the university save for academics and admissions. Quoth John Ruddy, one of the Lansdowne Live leaders (and a former Ravens defensive back):

"The Ravens would utilize our professional training facilities, they’d play in a new, fan-friendly stadium and they’d leverage our marking and operations staff ... At the end of the day, I think those elements would benefit recruiting and player development and fast-track success on the field."

David Naylor, the excellent Globe & Mail football reporter, noted this gives Jeff Hunt, Roger Greenberg, John Shenkman and Ruddy an important card to play in their negotiations with the city:

"... The revitalization of Lansdowne starts to look less like the building of a home for a CFL team and more like the construction of a community asset that will be used for two sports at both the amateur and professional levels.

That is surely the message the (Jeff) Hunt group wants to get out in advance of city council vote scheduled for Aug. 26."

Two questions pop immediately to mind:

1. How does this affect the Ottawa Gee-Gees, who play at Lansdowne? As an ottawasun.com user noted, the Gee-Gees would not want to play at a stadium run by a group which is putting its fundraising and marketing expertise toward their cross-town rivals. It would be similar to the situation where Waterloo used Laurier's stadium for many years, the irony here being the Gee-Gees have been a powerhouse while Carleton was an also-ran more often than not.
   
   
2. Carleton coming back likely means another OUA school is exploring starting a football team to bring the conference to even 12. Not to play coy, but feel free to speculate away about who might be that school. The one these ears heard would be a stunner.

Golden Gaels: Losing Dee Sterling to the Edmonton Eskimos probably leaves more of a hole in Pat Sheahan's two-deep than Mike Giffin making the Montréal Alouettes.

That is not a knock on Giffin, who made the Als as a fullback and special-teamer. Sterling going up to the CFL probably was less anticipated.

Meantime, Thaine Carter, the middle linebacker, ripped up his shoulder at Winnipeg Blue Bombers camp and Osie Ukwuoma might remain on the Calgary Stampeders practice roster, so that is three players lost off the front seven if Sterling stays in Edmonton and Carter does not comeback from his surgery. In order, that means Queen's is without a linebacker who could play sideline to sideline, its best rusher coming off the edge and a disruptor in the middle of the defensive line.

The Whig's article from last Friday noted cornerback-kick returner Jimmy Allin is a maybe to return for a fifth season. Centre Dan Bederman is "expected to return."

Meantime, good on Giffin for making the Alouettes. He was in tough after converting from tailback, since one of the other fullback spots was being used for Martin Bédard, a tight end from UConn who can also long snap. Giffin is not the first Queen's rushing star to earn his keep in the CFL as a fill-in back and special teamer. Bryan Crawford is going into his fifth season with the Toronto Argonauts, while Brad Elberg did it for the better part of a decade.

It just took Giff a little time to commit to the switch:

"I didn't go in with a good attitude last year (with Hamilton) ... My head just wasn't in it with my wife (Heidi) being eight months pregnant. I didn't think I had to perform. I was naive."
— Kingston Whig-Standard

Related:
Carleton aims for return of football (Terri Saunders, Sun Media, June 25)

(Cross-posted to cisblog.ca.)

CIS Corner: Former GGs goalie defence lawyer in hockey assault trial

Notes on athletes/teams from The 613 ... this is an old post, but pro hockey player Robin Gomez was acquitted after being charged with an on-ice assault.

You might have seen mention about the trial of Robin Gomez, a Victoria Salmon Kings player who is charged with assault causing bodily harm in connection with a fight that occurred during an ECHL game in March 2008.

What people might be interested to know is that former Ottawa Gee-Gees goalie Jordan Watt (pictured) is one of Gomez's defence lawyers, along with his father, Alexander "Sandy" Watt.

Gomez's accuser is Chris Ferraro, a former NHLer who was playing for the Las Vegas Wranglers. Here's the crux of what's before the court, as detailed by the
Victoria Times-Colonist:

"Gomez can be seen stepping onto the ice from the Salmon Kings bench, skating up to the Wranglers forward and punching him on the right side of the face. The blow sends Ferraro to the ice, hitting his head, as the crowd screams and a brawl breaks out between the two teams.

" 'I saw something out of the corner of my eye. Ten to 15 minutes later, I was coming out of an unconscious state, getting (eight) stitches to the back of my head,' said Ferraro, whose twin brother, Peter, also a Wranglers player, sat in the court gallery.

" ...Ferraro said that for about five weeks after the attack, he suffered from Bell's palsy, a short-term paralysis to the left side of his face."

It's for the court to decide if a criminal conviction is warranted

It just seems like an interesting intersection of the highways and byways of Canadian hockey and legal annals.

Watt played for the Gee-Gees from 2000-04 and after a two-year stint as an assistant coach, ended up playing a fifth and final season in '06-07. Before you form preconceived notions about the son of a lawyer who is now a lawyer, he had an unusual background for a hockey player and a lawyer. Watt was raised mostly by his mother, who died when he was 14, and his grandparents. He didn't play hockey until he was in his teens, and made his first WHL team as a walk-on. He was a very good interview subject, so it seemed post-worthy when I saw his name pop up in the news.

GAELS: Queen's announced two newbies for coach Brett Gibson:

• Stéphane Chabot, defence — The 6-foot-1, 208-lb. Rockland, Ont., native is pretty much your standard stay-at-home D-man. Chabot helped the Kingston Kimco Voyageurs reach the RBC Cup, the national Junior A championship last season, after playing in the OHL (if not for an OHL team) with the cross-town Frontenacs in 2007-08. His first two major junior seasons were in Brampton.
  
  It's not surprising Queen's would recruit a player from the Voyageurs. Gibson and assistant coaches Alyn McCauley and Andrew Haussler are all Vees alumni.
  
  
• Payton Liske, winger — Listed at 6-foot-4, 212 lbs., Liske should bring some beef up front and the numbers he put up with Saint John in the QMJHL the past two seasons (18 and 19 goals, 43 and 45 points) suggest he might add some badly needed scoring punch for the Gaels. He was also honoured as one of junior hockey's top scholastic players, so he's got that goin' for him, which is nice.
  
  Queen's scored an OUA-worst 57 goals last winter. It doesn't take P.J. Stock to point out you cannot win many games if you don't score a lot of goals, although P.J. Stock probably would point that out.
  
  Liske played for Owen Sound and Sault Ste. Marie in the OHL before getting his release and going to the QMJHL. (Saint John seems to lead the Q in taking former OHLers.)

With regard to Chabot, it was kind of a running joke in Kingston hockey circles last season that the Voyageurs had their best season in team history while using three players who had been released by the OHL's Frontenacs. The Frontenacs had a great season if you asked their owner and his army of apologists, although it was not reflected in the standings or tangible reality.

Related:
Assault trial of former Salmon King: Star hockey player says he was sucker-punched; Fighting is regular part of hockey, defence says (Katie DeRosa, Victoria Times-Colonist)
Trial on hockey assault charge opens in Victoria (CBC.ca)

(Links via Gregg Drinnan at Taking Note.)

Bleeding Tricolour: Bagg lights up land of the Big Sky

It looks like former Queen's Golden Gaels receiver Rob Bagg is faring pretty well in his third training camp with the Saskatchewan Roughriders. Bagg ended up playing a lot last season when the 'Riders had seventy-eight receivers on the injured list (not quite, but almost). The Regina Leader-Post is running a feature on Bagg in its Tuesday edition.

The Regina Leader-Post's beat writers mentioned the former Gaels all-Canadian in some recent dispatches at Rider Rumblings. From Sunday:

"On the turf, Chris Jones and Rob Bagg took turns making dazzling catches. Bagg made a lovely gliding catch on a pass from Dalton Bell and Jones showed his speed when he cut under a defender for what turned out to be an easy reception. He just made it look effortless.

"LB Sean Lucas and Bagg also had a spirited battle during one-on-one drills. It was a great moment within training camp. Lucas had Baggg covered on a sideline route. Bagg battled to get open and Bell delivered the perfect pass for the catch. It was a play where everyone did their job. Pretty to watch."

Former Ottawa Gee-Gees receiver Adam Nicolson also "went down during a drill with an injury to his left knee or calf." It seems like Nicolson, the former B.C. Lions draft choice, has often been snakebitten with injuries.

Also, from Friday:

"With so much going on off the field, it was tough keeping track of what was taking place on the turf. Rob Bagg made a spectacular, twisting 45-yard reception on a pass from Dalton Bell."

With everything Bagg can do on special teams, the 'Riders might have to find a spot for him along with their two Canadian slotbacks, Jason Clermont and Andy Fantuz. Granted, 'Riders fans are worrying more about who's going to be throwing the lion's shares of the passes, not who's going to be catching them.

You remember Andy Fantuz. He won the Hec Crighton award at Western in 2005, was nails when the 'Riders won the Grey Cup in '07 and no true Queen'sman will admit that he might have been a more dominant Canadian university receiver than No. 3, Jock Climie. Hell, it's even hard to admit there was a better slotback at an Ontario school than James MacLean.

(Cross-posted to cisblog.ca.)

CIS Corner: Longer hockey schedule for OUA

Notes on our athletes/teams of interest from The 613 ...

Ottawa Gee-Gees coach Dave Leger was kind enough to explain the tweaks to the OUA men's hockey league, both the schedule and playoff format.

The OUA has expanded the playoffs and eliminated the first-round playoff bye in the wake of a post-season where none of four playoff seeds made it to the Queen's Cup, the conference championship series. (Trois-Rivières was the only one to win a playoff round, and it needed two overtimes in the decider vs. Fred Parker's Carleton Ravens.) The trade-off is 16 of 19 teams will make the playoffs — 8-of-10 in the East, which adds the expansion Nipissing Lakers, 8-of-9 in the West.

It seems much tidier just to revise the post from earlier.

• The playoffs will be a true 1-through-8, meaning an end to barely .500 teams earning the No. 2 seed and getting a first-round bye. Last season's No. 2 seeds, Toronto in the East and York in the West, had the fourth- and fifth-best records in their conferences.
  
  "The main feature is having two more playoff teams on each side," Leger said. "We'll still have the four divisions, but the only purpose for those delineations is to help sort out the cross-over scheduling."
  
  
• There is more of an emphasis on conference play. Cross-over scheduling will be set up to "achieve balance over a period of time." It will take 3-4 years for everyone to play everyone, but the intention is to address concerns that certain teams played the Lakeheads of the world more often than some of their rivals.
  
  "There was a real appetite from the coaches to have a cross-over," Leger says. "There was talk about having all East teams play all West teams, but some of the coaches and athletic directors weren't too happy. However, there was a lot of interest to have a cross-over, and thankfully we're going to have one.
  
  "Having a strong team like a Waterloo or a Western is good for our team and good for our school."
  
  
• It seems like cross-over play, based on two teams' schedules which were posted online, will all take place before Jan. 1. That means teams will be going head-to-head during the closing sprint that begins on the first weekend of January, which is a positive development.
  
  Last season, Ottawa was dealing with an injury bug when it went just 1-2-1 during a four-game swing vs. Mid West teams, which made it harder for hold off Queen's for the final playoff spot.
  
  
• The schedule is sticking at 28 games. Lakehead and Queen's each posted schedules that had 30 conference games, but the schedule increase didn't get approval.
  

As a personal opinion, the net gain seems to be increasing the integrity of the post-season. There might be some sniping about increasing the size of the playoff tournament, especially after Canada West reduced its from six teams to four. However, the OUA is essentially doing the same thing, getting rid of byes in the post-season that can leave a team sitting around and doing special teams drills for a week.

Meantime, Leger did pass along some recruiting news with a Kingston angle. Stay-at-home defenceman Tyler Hill, who captained the Kingston Kimco Voyageurs team which won the Central Canadian title, is joining the Gee-Gees.

(Thanks to Todd Mathers for the tip. Cross-posted to cisblog.ca.)

Noteworthy

• It's a few days old, but Queen's linebacker Thaine Carter is vowing to play like an angry young man at the Winnipeg Blue Bombers training camp after going in the last round of the draft.
• Point guard Courtnay Pilypaitis, the Ottawa native who led the U of Vermont to the NCAA Tournament, has been named to Canada's women's basketball team for the 2009 World University Games, which begin July 1 in Belgrade, Serbia.
  
  This probably has to be folded into that omnibus post about how badly Canada Basketball is being hosed (by the media, corporate Canada, the federal ministry of sport assuming Canada still has one, and so on), but Canada is travelling with only 10 players. That is like sending a hockey team to the world juniors with only five defencemen.

CIS Corner: Moving by Stealth; escalating the Canal War

Notes on our athletes/teams of interest from The 613, plus some notes on Toronto's newest basketball team, the Toronto Stealth ...

WOMEN'S HOOPS: The Toronto Stealth semi-pro team began its maiden season in the Women's Blue-Chip Basketball League on Saturday ... suffice to say, Toronto Star hoops chronicler Doug Smith came away impressed:

"It was a rather interesting, and somewhat surprising to me, night at Ryerson on Saturday. I was fully impressed by the crowd – more than 100 doesn’t sound like much but I’ve been at national team events the past without audiences that big and it was a Saturday night of a long weekend for a team no one’s heard of at a gym that you need a GPS to find.

"The calibre of play wasn't the greatest but you have to figure it's only going to get better and that’s the most important thing. There needs to be places for women – and men – to develop their skills during or after their college careers and this is a perfect opportunity.

"Minor league sports, particularly minor league basketball is this (Toronto) market, is a dicey proposition at best and who knows how long the Stealth will actually last. But I think it deserves a chance, and it deserves some support; I presume I'll be back if time permits and if I had a young daughter interested in the game, I'd take her to see the Stealth play some night.

"You should, too."

The Stealth's CIS contingent includes former Brock star Jodie Ebeling, a five-time OUA all-star who was once invited to a WNBA free-agent camp. Three current or former U of T posts, Laila Bellony, Tara Kinnear and Nicki Schutz, are also on the team, along with guard Kim Lee (Waterloo) and forwards Kerri Jilesen (Laurier) and Ashley Stephen (St. FX).

The Stealth's home games are at Kerr Hall on the Ryerson campus, all on Saturday night at 7 p.m. Their home games include:

• May 30 vs. Flint
• June 6 vs. Detroit
• June 27 vs. Detroit
• July 18 vs. Montreal

NOTES FROM A CROSS-TOWN RIVALRY

It would be remiss to not share a comment from cisblog.ca on a post about Shelley Coolidge leaving the University of Ottawa to lead the Carleton Ravens women's hockey team.

"This is only the beginning as coaches realize the wide difference in ability, social skills and production between the 2 athletic directors and commitment to sport at the 2 universities."

FOOTBALL

• The Paper of Record had a nice feature on former Ottawa Gee-Gees footballer Trevor Monaghan's work with Cree youth in Chisasabi, Que., near James Bay.

  "This is the second year Monaghan has brought kids from Chisasabi. Last year, 17 came made the two-day bus ride. This year, 25 have achieved the school attendance level required to come to camp.
  
  Monaghan is planning to start a summer six-on-six tackle program in Chisasabi, a community that doesn't yet have a dedicated football field.
  
  The camp in Ottawa is spring training for players, whom he hopes will bring their new enthusiasm back to other teens in Chisasabi."

  Monaghan's bio says he played for the Gee-Gees from 1997-99 and again in 2001. One wishes him all the best in his efforts.
  
  
• The indispensable Capital Region Football Blog has an update on the collegiate destination if some local gridders: Guard James Lindsay (Nepean HS/Ottawa Myers Riders) and defensive tackle James Young (Gloucester/Cumberland Panthers) are headed to Acadia; linebacker Kyle Norris (South Carleton High School/Myers) is going to Saint Mary's

(Cross-posted to cisblog.ca.)

Related:
Semi-pro league gives women's hoops a boost (Doug Smith, Toronto Star, May 17)

CIS Corner: GGs' Cornell, Gaels' Sterling on CFL's list

It would be remiss to omit mention that Queen's defensive tackle Dee Sterling and Ottawa linebacker Mike Cornell are both on the CFL Scouting Bureau's list of top Canadian university prospects.

The first two rounds of the draft air Saturday at 1 p.m. Eastern on TSN.

Each team has its own ideas about what it needs, so you can't infer too much from a generalized list.

If memory serves, the Edmonton Eskimos are pretty high on Dee Sterling, who has the specs to play in the CFL (he's big, and awfully quick). Cornell got good coaching from Ottawa and it's not hard to see someone with his quickness giving a team a good backup linebacker and special teams player. One of his former defensive mates with the Gee-Gees, defensive back Delroy Clarke, saw the field with the Toronto Argonauts last season as a rookie.

The complete list:

1. Simeon Rottier, offensive line, Alberta (1)
   
2. Jamall Lee, running back, Bishop's (2)
3. Étienne Légaré, defensive line, Laval (4)
4. Matt Carter, slotback, Acadia (8)
5. Dylan Steenbergen, offensive line, Calgary (9)
6. Matt Morencie, offensive line, Windsor (3)
7. Dee Sterling, defensive line, Queen's (-)
8. Tamon George, defensive back, Regina (13)
9. Matt Morris, defensive back, Toronto (-)
10. James Yurichuk, linebacker, Bishop's (-)
11. Scott McHenry, slotback, Saskatchewan (6)
12. Jonathan Pierre-Étienne, defensive line, Montreal (-)
13. Steve Myddelton, offensive line, St. Francis Xavier (7)
14. Mike Cornell, linebacker, Ottawa (11)
15. Stan Van Sichem, defensive line, Regina (-)

Cross-posted to cisblog.ca.

CIS Corner; GGs part ways with former Syracuse guard

Saying Josh Wright went wrong for the Ottawa Gee-Gees was a bit much. At the end of the day, Ottawa coach Dave DeAveiro took a high-reward move on a legit NCAA D-1 point guard. The just-the-facts-ma'am is that the Gee-Gees were ranked high as No. 2 in the country and ended up bowing out of the Final 8 hunt with a 20-some-point loss to Western in the first round. There's no getting past that, really, although granted, Western was probably good enough to win the national championship.

"Guard Josh Wright will not return to the Gee-Gees men's basketball team next season.

"The six-foot-one transfer from Utica, New York who played half a season in the CIS is hoping to secure a professional contract in Europe.

" 'It's something we thought would happen,' said Gee-Gees men's head basketball coach Dave DeAveiro. 'It was his goal to play pro somewhere.'

"Wright, 22, scored just under 17 points per game over 12 regular season games with uOttawa after joining the Gee-Gees in December, 2008 following three seasons at Syracuse.

"It is not known where Wright intends to play. A call to his home in New York State was not returned." — school release

Wright was a treat to watch, but there were a few along press row at the Final 8 who felt he did not make Gee-Gees combo guard Josh Gibson-Bascombe a better player.

The Gee-Gees will be a bit of a X-factor in the OUA in 2009-10. Carleton has the automatic entry into the Final 8, so once again an OUA East team will have two shots to qualify for nationals, either be winning the division or a third-place game. Ottawa will have new starters at the 4 and 5 spots, since David Labentowicz and Dax Dessureault have graduated. Forward Nemanja Baletic and centre Louis Gauthier each started to come on at the end of last season.

Sophomore swingman Warren "Worldwide" Ward is going to have nights where he takes your breath away, while third-year man Jacob Gibson-Bascombe and fifth-year senior Donnie Gibson are still in the backcourt picture.

Cross-posted to cisblog.ca.

CIS Corner: Hoops hotshots Hinz, Faulkner commit to CU; reports

Two out of three ain't bad for Dave Smart and the Carleton Ravens.

Much vaunted forward Tyson Hinz of Orleans according to Hoopstars Canada, is committed to Carleton. Six-foot-5 swingman Greg Faulkner out of Kingston, also a Hoopstars Canada top 50 player, is headed to Carleton, the Kingston Whig-Standard reported this morning.

Hinz' decision was probably the most closely watched in Ottawa basketall circles, since he led his St. Matthew Tigers to a 45-1 season and the Ontario AAA title. His dad, Will Hinz, was a superb player at McGill during the 1980s, where he has a Rhodes Scholar at McGill, which sparked talk his son would follow in his footsteps, plus Redmen coach Craig Norman has often recruited in the Ottawa area (Orleans' Kevin Dulude was the lynchpin when Norman had RMC playing winning basketball in the first half of the 2000s.)

Tyson Hinz is a bit of a combo forward who does everything well, so some Aaron Doornekamp comparisons will be inevitable.

Incidentally, Faulkner's club coaches were Rob Smart Sr. and Duncan Cowan, the Queen's coaches. His literary namesake should concoct such a subplot.

"Duncan and Rob have done a lot for me to get me where I am. It's just that I want to move on and try something different."
— Faulkner, via Whig sports editor Mike Koreen

The estimable Koreen also caught up with Acadia-bound post player Owen Klassen, who played club ball with Faulkner on the Kingston Impact and against him in high school. Klassen's high school coach at Bayridge Secondary, Geoff Stewart, told The Whig:

"Owen can make a significant impact. I've compared him to Aaron Doornekamp. He has a similar skill set, he's tall and co-ordinated and he can play inside and outside like Aaron."

Klassen would have been a great get. The upshot is the Ravens are getting the second- and third-best players out of Eastern Ontario, although ratings aren't the be-all, end-all.

HOCKEY

Gee-Gees: Ottawa forward Dan McDonald, who joined the ECHL's Utah Grizzlies after the CIS season ended, had a four-goal game last Saturday ("the mortorboard trick") vs. the Alaska Aces. The former Kingston Frontenac (for 2½ seasons) has had a decent pro debut with 13 points (seven goals, six assists) in 16 games.

The plan is for McDonald to return to Ottawa, write his exams and rejoin Utah for the playoffs. (Please don't wonder how it is that athletes at other Ontario universities located in and around London, Ont., can be off working out for NFL teams during examination periods.)

Ravens: Former Carleton d-man Brodie Beard is reportedly committed to play at Nipissing University, the new expansion entry in the OUA, according to BayToday.ca.

(Cross-posted to cisblog.ca. Thanks to a commenter for the hook-up on Hinz; thanks to Gee-Gees coach Dave Leger for the McDonald note.)

CIS Corner: Good Gaels moments galore

Notes on our athletes/teams of interest from The 613 ...

GOLDEN GAELS

The hardest-working man in the sports information business, Mike Grobe at Queen's, sent along a link. Queen's is having an online poll to pick the top sporting moment of the 2008-09 school year

The candidates, in chronological order:

• Oct. 4-5: Queen's men's rugby, football, men's soccer and women's hockey all score shutout victories by an aggregate score of 195 to nothing.
• Oct. 18: Football and men's rugby teams complete unbeaten regular seasons. And everyone lived happily ever after, the end.
• Oct. 25: Men's and women's rowing teams sweep the OUA team titles; women win go on to win silver and men take the bronze at the Canadian championships
• Oct. 26: Women's lacrosse team captures its fourth OUA silver medal in a row.
• Nov. 21: Football's Pat Sheahan and Thaine Carter are recognized as the coach of the year and top defensive player in Canadian university football.
• Jan. 7: Brittany Moore of the women's basketball Gaels become the first player in team history to score 40 points in a game, breaking the single-game record held by one of her coaches, Claire Meadows.
• Jan. 24: Moore scores the ultimate uncontested layup to give Queen's a last-second, one-point win over Carleton. The Ravens failed to take their positions in the lane for the last of three free-throw attempts, leaving Moore undefended. (And in no way did this site or any of its spin-offs beat this story into the ground, except in every way possible.)
  
• Feb. 3: Billy Burke, serving as interim captan, scores the overtime game-winner for the men's hockey team in a road game against Carleton. Burke had six goals in his first three games wearing the 'C' after recording just three in his first 21 games.
• Feb. 19: Men's volleyball team wins the OUA silver meal for the second year in a row.
• March 3: Amanda Morra fires a hat trick to help the women's hockey team upset nationally ranked U of T in the playoffs; they ended up extending eventual CIS runners-up Laurier to the full three games in the OUA semis.
  

Voting is open through Saturday, March 28, closing at midnight.

GEE-GEES

It won't be too long till training camp. Here's a highlight-reel pass-and-run play from Gee-Gees recruit Brendan Gillanders from last fall:

CIS Corner: Hats off to Carleton

A journo friend once said what she loved about her job was that every day, you start at zero.

That analogy, at least from afar, fits the Carleton Ravens to a T (as in Turnbull, Stuart, whose 22-point, seven-rebound effort in Sunday's 87-77 championship-game win over the UBC Thunderbirds sealed the Kingston area's sweep of the Final 8 most outstanding player awards, since Napanee's Matteke Hutzler was the MOP for the Simon Fraser women's team). The way Carleton pulled it off on Saturday night, when Turnbull hit the last-second game-winner to beat Western, naturally lent itself to speculation about an emotional letdown. Everyone remembered how Acadia took down Carleton on semi-final Saturday last March and then lost to Brock less than 24 hours later.

That's all it was, talk. Carleton seems to have an attitude that if what you did yesterday still seems big, then you cannot have done much today. Mark Masters from Streaming Sports Network Canada, who was on the beat when the Ravens had that famous win streak 4-5 years ago, recalled on the air yesterday how coach Dave Smart often downplayed it, pointing out that the school didn't count losses vs. NCAA Division 1 teams. There was a logic behind it; why count when everything resets to zero as soon as the game's over?

No one on the outside looking in can ever know for sure, but that indicates why Carleton's final two wins, over the second- and third-best teams in Canada, played out the way it did in the final weekend together for the Kingston trio of Turnbull, Rob Saunders and Aaron Doornekamp. It's convenient to say there was no way Carleton could lose after the white-knuckle ride vs. Western were spot-on, since it was such a perfect storyline. It has the accidental benefit of being right, since as Carleton has shown, they weren't going to get wrapped up in being part of an instant classic.

They played like they didn't have any laurels, so it didn't seem too worrisome when UBC was hitting shots from here and there and everywhere and staking itself to a 16-4 lead. Carleton was taking its time, figuring out UBC, waiting for the second half when they could plant the tracking device known as Rob Saunders inside 'Birds guard Chris Dyck's shirt (he scored only four of his team-high 21 points after the break with Saunders on him, and didn't make a basket in the second half until inside of the 1:20 mark). It would have been homerism writ large to say it on air, not to mention it had the potential to blow up in one's face, but when Carleton had UBC's lead down to a point at halftime, 37-36, it felt like the game was over. The Thunderbirds had lost their chance to build a lead while Turnbull and Doornekamp, a combined 2-of-10 in the first 20 minutes, were looking for their shots.

Sure enough, after the break, there they came, running off the first eight points to go ahead for good, with all eight rotation players contributing: The Kingston guys (Doornekamp ripped down three offensive rebounds in that period alone), the two starters from Ottawa, Kevin McCleery (15 points, eight rebounds; UBC didn't have an answer for him) and point guard Mike Kenny; and the bench brigade of Kyle Smendziuk, Cole Hobin and Elliot Thompson, who seemed to grow up right before everyone's eyes, although in reality all three had shown signs they could be counted on play major minutes (and, he added under his breath, with the officiating, they certainly had to).

It might have been a coincidence, but a lingering image is that when Carleton was celebrating on the floor, for a couple minutes Kyle Smendziuk had the CIS championship banner draped over his narrow shoulders like a cape. It seemed kind of symbolic, almost as if the older guys who'll be moving on had said, here, you wear this for a bit, but remember, next week you start at zero.

A couple more notes from the weekend:

• Carleton's seventh man, Elliot Thompson, was an exemplar of efficiency, scoring 11 points in just nine minutes on 3-for-5 shooting. He didn't look like a backup when he came in, and at 6-foot-4, can elevate for a shot from the perimeter. It was noticeable during the Western game that he was adept at running out to contest three-pointers without fouling. It will be fun to watch him next season.
• It will require going back to check for the exact quote, but CIS president Marg McGregor did address the issue of having two OUA teams meet in the quarter-finals. It all comes down to clarity; some people believe it's absolutely not allowed and some believe it's merely to be avoided if possible (it's the latter). She suggested there would be some direction that it not happen again.
  
• If you need someone to give you a push in order to be great, then UBC and Western held up their end of the bargain admirably. Both of those teams were capable.
• Any and all suggestions on how to better spend the four-hour block on Saturday taken up by two consolation side games are welcome. One suggestion: Hold an all-star game (most of the country's best players on non-tournament teams are in town for the all-Canadian awards) and a skills competition. Have a bronze-medal game on Sunday. Ottawa and Concordia played a very entertaining consolation game, but Calgary-Western for a bronze medal would have been off the hook.
  
• The Fates have a wicked sense of humour. Imagine if you had been told Carleton and Ottawa would make it to the final Sunday, only they wouldn't play each other.
  
  Dax Dessureault, who had 22 points and 13 rebounds in his Gee-Gees valedictory, an 83-76 conso-game win over Concordia, will be sorely missed, and so with the other five-year man, captain David Labentowicz.
  
  In terms of replacing them, Nemanja (Nemo) Baletic had a good second half of the season, while centre Louis Gauthier made a couple plays yesterday where it was easy to confuse him with Big Dax.
  
  
• It is among the site's sworn goals that by the time next season, Ottawa guard Warren Ward will be known as "Worldwide" Ward. He has that much potential.
• Some big ups have to go to Andrew Bucholtz, Jared Book and Rob Pettapiece for running the liveblogs all weekend at cisblog.ca.
  
  Rob, no word of a lie, got to Scotiabank Place about 30 minutes before the UBC-Calgary semi-final after travelling from Toronto and was up and running within about 15 minutes, since some clod of an editor didn't realize how rushed he'd been getting there. (Who was that guy?)
  
  
• Ernestown Secondary School turns 50 years old next year, but it pretty much was a mini-reunion by times. A quick roll call: On the premises by times were 1996 grad Adnan Virk working as The Score's sideline reporter, '97 grad Rob Smart coaching for Carleton, Aaron Doornekamp playing for the Ravens, Donnie Gibson playing for Ottawa, along with Aaron's siblings, Amy, Ben and Nate and cousin Mike Smart, a star on Carleton's '03-05 championship teams, out in support of their kin. All of them played on high school teams coached by Tom Turnbull, Stu's dad. It's worth mentioning now, since Aaron was the last one in the Eagles-to-Ravens pipeline that began with Rob and carried on with Mike, Ben and Jessica Smart.
  

Last but not least, thank you so much to readers who took time over the weekend to say some very nice things about OOLF and cisblog.ca.

(Photo by Rob Pettapiece)

Related:
Carleton wins sixth CIS basketball title in seven years (Wayne Kondro, Ottawa Citizen)
Ravens rule CIS roost again (Shane Ross, Sun Media)
Dax all, folks ... Dessureault goes out a winner with GGs
(Shane Ross, Sun Media)

CIS Corner: Gaels' Allin amazes ...

Notes on our athletes/teams of interest from The 613 ...

Did you see who had the fastest time in the shuttle run at the CFL evaluation camp?

There are major sports-geek points to anyone who noticed Queen's Golden Gaels defensive back-kick returner Jim Allin (pictured), clocked 3.97 seconds. Who knows what that might lead to considering that Allin is only 5-foot-10 and 170 lbs. and we're not a CFL personnel guy, but nevertheless. Allin was the first player to do the shuttle run (sprint five yards to the left, 10 yards to the right, five to the left back to where you started) in less than four seconds, taking a 10th of the second off the mark set by Laval's Mathieu Proulx, who's now with the Montréal Alouettes, at the 2005 E-Camp.

For sheer point of context-less comparison, Samuel Giguère, the Sherbrooke receiver who spent last season on the taxi squad with the NFL's Indianapolis Colts, had the fastest shuttle run in 2008 at 4.10 seconds.

There was probably an argument for Allin as the Golden Gaels' MVP last season, no mean feat on a team which had the Presidents' Trophy winner on defence (Thaine Carter), a 1,000-yard receiver (Scott Valberg), a 1,000-yard rusher (Mike Giffin, who ran like an angry young man) and a QB, Dan Brannagan, who set a school mark for TD passes in a season. Allin, a former high school quarterback, did a bit of everything, play cornerback, defensive halfback, return kicks, hold the ball for field goals, carry the ball on gadget plays on offence. (According to assistant coach Ricky Jimmy, he was like the Viet Cong out there.)

Allin is a unique player. He's on the small side, but a player with his skillset who also aspires to be a doctor? Someone in the CFL would want him, right?

The results are on the CFL website and it's bad form to just do a regurge of what interested readers can find for themselves. It is probably best not to get into why it's fascinating that Matt Lambros, a 6-foot-2, 205-lb. wide receiver who played at Liberty University, has very small hands, measuring only 8¾ inches from the tip of his pinkie, especially if you're of a kind of mind where you'll actually write a post about free-throw shooting in Canadian university basketball.

Queen's had centre Dan Bederman, defensive end Osie Ukwuoma, defensive tackle Dee Sterling and inside linebacker Thaine Carter. Sterling was one of five players to bench-press 225 lbs. 23 times, which one would figure might help his draft status. Who knows, we're not an expert; those in the know seem very high on the Ottawa Gee-Gees linebacker, Mike Cornell.

You probably already heard, but the Bishop's Gaiters Jamall Lee, son of former Rough Riders star Orville Lee (and someone who counts Napanee's own Leroy Blugh, his coach at BU, as a huge influence), ran a 4.39-second 40-yard dash. Has the NFL heard about Lee?

• Napanee's Matteke Hutzler, as you probably heard, earned most outstanding player honours while helping Simon Fraser win the CIS women's basketball championship on the weekend. SFU beat host Regina 68-62 in the final, with Hutzler scoring 11 points and contributing two steals and an assist during the final 120 seconds when the Clan was dotting the i's and crossing the T's on its second national title in three years.
  
  By unofficial count, she also set some pretty inpenetrable screens for about four, maybe five Simon Fraser three-pointers.
  
  There is all sort of news about that at Campus Chatter and there was a liveblog at cisblog.ca.
• The Score's broadcast team of Jason Thom and Christine Stapleton had a pretty solid weekend. Thom got off great line when a Regina three-pointer became a long two because the player had her tippy-toes on the line. "She bought the nines when she should have bought the 8½'s."
  
  It made up for the broadcasters saying Hutzler was from Nepean, Ontario, not Napanee. You have no idea how often that has happened, especially in loud bars as undergrad. "Where are you from?" ... "Napanee." ... "Nepean?" ... "Sure, Nepean."
• The Ottawa Gee-Gees, who got the series-winner from Brittany Jones vs. Carleton, after 26 minutes of overtime SUnday, are headed to the CIS women's hockey championship for a third straight season. For anyone wondering, yes, it was the first time a Quebec conference series went to double overtime in all three games.
  
  Ottawa was 16-of-16 on the penalty kill, which probably swung the balance a bit in a series which had only nine goals in the equivalent of five 60-minute games.
• A tip of the cap is due to Queen's 'tender Melissa John for her 57-save effort on Saturday. Laurier needed three overtimes, and a 5-on-3 power play, before Lauren Barch could finally wrap up the series for the Golden Hawks.
  
  Kingston native Karly Powers, who went to high school across the street from Queen's at KCVI, scored the tying goal for Laurier.

There will be lots to come at TCB this week. Mark Wacyk is back on the horse over at cishoops.ca and it betters language to explain how that is wonderful.

CIS Corner: Rantin' and Raven about Final 8 seeding

It is a point of pride that none of us had the Final 8 seedings bang on.

Three OUA teams on one side of the bracket, Western-Ottawa in the 4-5 game, with the winner possibly facing No. 1-seeded Carleton in a semi-final, frankly, stinks on every conceivable level.

It stinks because it might hurt attendance for the national semi-final since the Ravens, if they win Friday, will face a team they have already beaten more than once this season. The perception might be out there that it's a fait accompli for Carleton (talk to any Raven for 10 seconds and you'll be disabused of that notion). If people don't come out for semi-final Saturday, they might not return Sunday for the final. It also stinks because it seems like there was more mind paid to last season's big Ontari-ario-rama in the semi-final than to how this season has unfolded.

It stinks because there is a clear double standard. The guideline that conference foes should not meet in the first round was followed for the women's Final 8, where Cape Breton ended up seeded No. 7 when there was a strong argument they were better than No. 6 Saskatchewan. It also stinks because it smacks of the petty regionalism which has held back university sports for far, far too long.

It is understandable if there's a backlash against Carleton for being in automatically as the host team. However, visiting it upon the heads of Ottawa and Western is absolutely brutal. Coach Dave DeAveiro's Gee-Gees and Brad Campbell's Mustangs (that's right, OOLF is sticking up for Country Club U; Queen's is more like a yacht club since Kingston has better sailing) at least rate a shot at the best of the rest of Canada and a chance to succeed or fail on their own merits. Both of them are Top 5 teams. Ottawa has just four losses since November, all of them vs. the Nos. 1 and 2 seeds for the Final 8. Western has only lost four, two to the No. 1 team. Give them a shot at someone from outside their province, just as a true test.

Brock did come in with 13 losses last season, but at least it rated such a chance as the third team coming out of the OUA, since it was the 7 seed. Where teams are seeded isn't as big as having good matchups.

You know the rest of the story. The Badgers beat a team from the West Coast, Western took out one from the East Coast, Carleton beat one from the Prairies and the semi-finals ended up being a big Ontar-ari-ariorama, three teams from Upper Canada and one from the Maritimes (Acadia). Far be it to think that led to some teeth-gnashing everywhere else in between Halifax and Vancouver.

(Irony: That petty regionalism is a big reason why UBC wants to join the NCAA. The T-Birds end up with Final 8 first-timers Dalhousie instead of either Concordia, Ottawa or Western, who might be a tougher matchup. Prove this alumnus wrong, Dal.)

There is no easy out for why, for one basketball tournament, the seedings are arranged so Canada West teams don't meet in the first round, and why for the other, it's set up so it cannot be an all-Ontario final. There might be some aspect of the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing;

One conference, which has produced the national championship team six years running, has three of the Top 5 teams in the country. Two of its schools can sell 10,000 tickets for a regular-season game in the dead of January in the midst of the longest transit strike in their city's history. We should be proud, as Canadians, that we have built up our collegiate basketball to such a point and instead something like this happens. With all due respect, it is hard to understand the logic behind these choices, and I'll prefer to think there is more to due with that than it running counter to our choices from last night.

Here are the seedings. For point of comparison, here

1. Carleton (Host/OUA champion)
   
2. Calgary (Canada West champion)
   
3. UBC (Canada West silver medallist)
   
4. Western (OUA West champion)
   
5. Ottawa (OUA bronze medallist)
   
6. Dalhousie (AUS champion)
   
7. Concordia (Quebec champion)
   
8. St. Francis Xavier (wild card)
   

It should be a good tournament, nevertheless. The game can overcome all.

(Cross-posted to cisblog.ca.)

CIS Corner: Must avoid ... March Madness/Avril wordplay

Nice feature in the Van Province on Simon Fraser Clan centre Matteke Hutzler "from tiny Napanee, Ont.," whose No. 1-seeded Clan face the Ottawa Gee-Gees in the first game of the CIS Final 8 women's basketball championship.

"And the new Hutzler's attitude hasn't been lost on Clan head coach Bruce Langford.

"' It's taken her a while to get hooked on the game of basketball, but right now, she is hooked,' he said. "Is she just scratching the surface? I think she's still beneath the surface, maybe just starting to stick her head up for air.' "

Napanee is tiny, yes, but it stands to add another name to its roll call of Gee-Gees nemeses which begins with Carleton coach Dave Smart. It would be great if Ottawa pulled it off somehow, but loyalty to my birthplace has to come first.

(Update: Simon Fraser won, 89-42, with Hutzler producing a 15-point, 10-rebound double-double. Hannah Sunley-Paisley had 17 & 10 for Ottawa; tough way for Gee-Gees such as Katie Laurie to go out.)

Related:
Muddy sees clearly now, Clan forward playing her best basketball as CIS nats set to begin (Howard Tsumura, Little Man at Campus)

CIS Corner: Ravens rip through Round 3; GGs face third-place game

OUA East final: No. 1 Carleton 82, No. 3 Ottawa 61 — The Ravens often find a way of cutting to the quick, eh?

When you walk into the Ravens' Nest, your head is full of all sorts of ifs to contemplate, especially when you're rooting for the story. Carleton made it seem so slap-your-forehead simple. The Ravens got open looks, held the Gee-Gees' JJs, Josh Gibson-Bascombe and Josh Wright, to just one basket between them in the first 20 minutes and the game was done by halftime. It was only a 15-point margin, but like Dave DeAveiro said, "there's no playing catch-up against that team."

Ottawa, as both Dave Smart and Aaron Doornekamp said, might be the second-best team in Canada. It just had no chance of taking down Carleton in the final home game for the Kingston trio of Doornekamp, Stu Turnbull and Rob Saunders, even though the Ravens, as Final 8 hosts, had nothing tangible on the line last night.

"We don't have to win these games (tonight's and the Wilson Cup vs. Western on Saturday), but we have to get better every day," Doornekamp said after putting up 25 points, nine rebounds and six assists. "You don't often get a situation like this, where you have a great atmosphere and you're playing the No. 2 team in the country, at worst No. 3, so tonight was very good for us."

Carleton had 16-4 and 16-3 runs in the first 20 minutes, never trailing after a pair of threes in quick succession from Mike Kenny (11 points) near the end of the first quarter and Ottawa started to recede, inch by inch, which might not wear well on the Final 8 seeding committee. The Gee-Gees, who have averaged nearly 84 points per game vs. the rest of the OUA, have been held to 72, 69 and 59 in their three losses to the Ravens.

"I still think they (Ottawa) are the second-best team in Canada and if they beat us in 10 days, they'll be the best team in Canada," Smart said. "They got some good looks that didn't go in. I think they're the second-best team in Canada."

Carleton's five-man game was in full effect. You know the drill. One shot per possession, make the other team beat you with its third and fourth-best scorers. Kenny, Saunders and Turnbull did a job vs. Wright (13 points on 5-of-16 shooting) and Gibson-Bascombe (12). The halftime boxscore didn't even credit JGB with taking a shot (he had two trips to the foul line). When was the last time that happened to him?

"We just tried to play the percentages with them because they have so much talent," said Saunders, the OUA East defensive player of the year who had 11 points, including some big baskets early in the second quarter when it was still a one-shot game. "Sometimes they're going to make shots. We have to give a lot of credit to the posts, because they let us take some chances. There's a lot of trust there."

That second run in the first half, highlighted some some slick interior passing with most of the points coming through Doornekamp and Kevin McCleery (17 points, six rebounds), pretty much did in Ottawa.

"I thought we did a decent job of executing," Smart said. "I thought we were aggressive against their pressure and their switches. When you play Ottawa, you want to contain their transition and we were able to do that, for the most part."

The Gee-Gees have now lost the last four times they were in a game where the winner qualified for the Final 8, but three were against Carleton. Talk about a cross to bear. One would wonder how they keep coming back from that. Gibson-Bascombe said the right things about having to regroup. DeAveiro, as you might expect, wasn't putting a ton of stock in Ottawa's regular-season win in Windsor's gym, since that was four months ago (Josh Wright wasn't yet playing for Ottawa).

All in all, Carleton looked impressive. They won by more than 20 despite a rough shooting night for Turnbull, who was 2-of-16 for six points just hours after being named OUA East player of the year.

Ottawa should like its chances against Windsor, considering that they will have the two best guards in the game and will be at home to a team which has a reputation as an easier mark on the road. Ottawa has only five losses all season, all to Top 5 teams, but when three are to a team you share a city with, it might be tough to keep that in perspective.

(Cross-posted to cisblog.ca.)

CIS Corner: Kingston's Turnbull up for player of the year

Carleton's tri-captain and fifth-year senior guard Stu Turnbull will be the OUA East candidate for the Mike Moser Trophy, edging out Ryerson big man Boris Bakovic and Ottawa's Josh Gibson-Bascombe, who plays the same two-guard spot for Ottawa.

Turnbull is a good call if you go by the rule of thumb individual awards should be a byproduct of a team's accomplishment, which is a decent first principle. The Kingston native is No. 1-ranked Carleton's leading scorer and outscored Gibson-Bascombe, 29-18 and 22-19, in the Ravens' season-series sweep of the Gee-Gees (heading into tonight's OUA East final). That's the end-of-story right there for many people. The statistical argument, going by the game scores which Rob Pettapiece compiled, provide at least a neat counter-point.

Bakovic had the highest game score in the country, 18.4. Gibson-Bascombe was second in the OUA and fifth in the CIS; Turnbull was 10th and 39th, respectively. Strictly for argument's sake, bearing in mind that as Rob notes, "Sophisticated metrics aren't really possible with the limited CIS stats we have available," here are the Top 10 players in the OUA by adjusted game score (national ranking in brackets, conference regular season only):

1. Bakovic, Ryerson, 18.4 (1st)
2. Gibson-Bascombe, Ottawa, 14.1 (5th)
3. Aaron Doornekamp, Carleton, 12.0 (14th)
4. Dax Dessureault, Ottawa, 11.4 (18th)
5. Greg Surmacz, Windsor, 11.1 (21st)
6. Keenan Jeppesen, Western, 10.9 (23rd)
   
7. Matas Tirilis, Laurentian, 10.1 (33rd)
8. Josh Wright, Ottawa, 10.0 (34th)
9. Tut Ruach, York, 9.6 (36th)
10. Turnbull, Carleton, 9.4 (39th)

People who have seen the Ravens play know how much Turnbull matters to them at each end of the floor. The Ottawa games were high-leverage and he came through in both cases (Rob adjusts based on team's RPI).

Stats are a way to make a sense of the game from the outside looking in. The godfather himself, Bill James once said, "There are a lot of things that you just can't see from out here, folks. Dedication and leadership and desire and committment; I see glimpses of all that, but you just can't see those things clearly from the outside, and it's silly to pretend you can."

Those making the selections saw in Turnbull, a team leader who's put up solid numbers across the board (16.7 points and 5.1 boards). He's a guard who can score from inside and outside, play physical defence, bring the ball up the floor and help on the boards, where Carleton almost doubled the next-best team in rebounding margin.

It's a good argument, to say the least.

Briefly, Carleton's Rob Saunders was named OUA East defensive player of the year, while his and Turnbull's fellow Frontenac Secondary School graduate, Queen's forward Mitch Leger, was named to the second all-star team.

Carleton's honourees were also Dave Smart (coach of the year), Aaron Doornekamp (first all-star team) and Kyle Smendziuk (all-rookie team). Ottawa's Dax Dessureault is the TSN Ken Shields Award nominee; he and Gibson-Bascombe were both first-team all-stars, while swingman Warren Ward was named to the rookie team.

Ottawa native Greg Carter, a point guard at Lakehead who led the OUA in steals, was named to the OUA West rookie team.

(Cross-posted to cisblog.ca.)