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| Mason Nyhus (#8) and the Huskies aim to get past the Dinos. |
They are a habit for the University of Calgary Dinos.
Last year,
these two teams battled for the Hardy Cup at McMahon Stadium in Calgary, Alta.,
to determine a champion for the Canada West Conference. The Huskies stormed to
a 43-18 victory to claim their first conference title since 2006.
On
Saturday, these two teams will meet again at the same location on the U Sports
playoff trail. The Huskies (6-3 overall) and Dinos (7-2 overall) will battle it
out again for supremacy in the Canada West in this year’s Hardy Cup (2 p.m.
Saskatchewan time, CJWW 600, SaskTel TV).
The winner
earns the opportunity to host a U Sports semifinal playoff contest in the
Mitchell Bowl.
On top of
trying to bring the Hardy Cup back to Saskatoon for a second straight year, the
Huskies are appearing in their second conference title game in the last 10 U
Sports campaigns.
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| The Huskies will try to get to Dinos QB Adam Sinagra, left. |
“They are a
very good team,” said Huskies quarterback Mason Nyhus. “They always have been.
“I’m sure
they will be for years to come. We have our work cut out for us, but I am very
excited for the opportunity.”
The two
sides met once this season, with the Huskies pulling out a 29-15 victory on
Sept. 27 at Griffiths Stadium in Saskatoon. The Dinos are 5-0 this season at
home in action during the regular season and post-season, while the Huskies are
1-3 on the road.
Even though
U of S won this same contest last year in Calgary, Huskies defensive back
Nelson Lokombo said that doesn’t mean history will repeat itself in this year’s
encounter.
“I think it is better to prepare for this
year’s Calgary team,” said Lokombo. “That is the best thing to do.
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| Ben Whiting had 39.5 total tackles in the regular season for the Huskies. |
“The past
is done now. We have to focus on the future.”
Nyhus
completed 138-of-228 passes for 1,739 yards, 13 touchdowns and nine
interceptions during the regular season for the Huskies.
Jesse Kuntz
and Sam Baker are the Huskies two biggest threats at receiver. Kuntz caught 29
passes for 347 yards and two touchdowns in eight regular season games.
Baker
missed the Huskies first five regular season games due to injury. In the
squad’s last three regular season games, Baker hauled in 15 passes for 236
yards and four touchdowns.
Star
running back Adam Machart has a superb year carrying the ball 156 times for
1,334 yards and eight touchdowns during the regular season. He also hauled in
20 passes for 204 yards and three touchdowns through the air.
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| Deane Leonard led the Dinos with four interceptions in the regular season. |
The Dinos
are led by fifth-year star quarterback Adam Sinagra. During the regular season,
Sinagra completed 159-of-256 passes for 2,014 yards, 13 touchdowns and 10
interceptions.
Sophomore receiver
Jalen Philpot was the Dinos top pass catcher hauling in 52 passes for 767 yards
and four touchdowns during the regular season.
Robinson
Rodrigues has taken over the starting duties at running back for the Dinos, and
he carried the ball 54 times for 271 yards during the regular season.
On defence,
super rookie outside linebacker Ramsey Derbas led the Huskies with 43 total
tackles in the regular season, while outside linebacker Ben Whiting had 39.5
total tackles.
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| Sam Baker has returned to top form with the Huskies. |
Middle
linebacker Grant McDonald topped the Dinos with 40.5 tackles, and he also had
2.5 sacks and one interception in the regular season. Defensive tackle J-Min
Pelley had 13 total tackles and equalled McDonald for the team high in regular
season sacks at 2.5.
Defensive
back Deane Leonard led the Dinos with four interceptions during the regular
season, and he returned two of those interceptions for touchdowns.
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| The Huskies need to celebrate a number of big plays to win the Hardy Cup. |
“They have
a whole bunch of different players, different staff,” said Flory. “They are a
different football team.
“They are
going to be prepared. They are well coached.”
Lokombo
said his side just wants to get the game on.
“This is
what we’ve been working towards during the season, so it is always a good
feeling knowing that it has paid off,” said Lokombo. “All the guys are super
excited.
“We really
stressed that we wanted to do it for our guys, our fifth-years and just
allowing ourselves to have an extra week to play football with each other. It
is awesome.”
Huskies haul away five Canada West season
awards
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| Adam Machart (#20) is the Canada West player of the year. |
On Thursday, the Huskies claimed five out of the seven major
awards handed out by the conference. That marked the most major individual
conference awards the Huskies have won in any season in program history.
Huskies star running back Adam Machart was named the player
of the year for Canada West by unanimous selection after a sensational campaign. He carried the ball 156 times for 1,334 yards and eight
touchdowns during the regular season. He also hauled in 20 passes for 204 yards
and three touchdowns through the air.
His total
of 1,334 yards rushing and 1,538 all-purpose yards are new Huskies team records
for one season. Machart led U Sports in rushing.
Defensive
tackle Evan Machibroda claimed honours as the conference’s most outstanding
lineman. The fifth-year veteran piled up 22 total tackles, five sacks, two
forced fumbles and one fumble recovery during the regular season.
Third-year
defensive back Nelson Lokombo was named the conference’s most outstanding
defensive player. Lokombo topped the Huskies with four interceptions, and he
returned two of those interceptions for touchdowns.
He posted
23.5 total tackles, 2.5 sacks and four pass breakups.
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| Scott Flory was named the Canada West coach of the year. |
Huskies
head coach Scott Flory was named the coach of the year for the Canada West
Conference after guiding the team to a 5-3 regular season record for the second
straight campaign. Flory is in his third season as the Huskies head coach.
He guided
the Huskies to a Canada West title last season and has the Huskies back in this
year’s Canada West final. This year’s Canada West title game will see the
Huskies face the U of Calgary Dinos on Saturday at McMahon Stadium in Calgary.
Fifth-year
defensive lineman Derek Dufault from the University of Manitoba Bisons took
home the student-athlete community service award for Canada West.
Veteran U
of Regina Rams defensive line coach Greg Nesbitt was named the Canada West
nominee for the Gino Fracas Award as conference’s volunteer coach of the year.
Nesbitt has been on the Rams staff for a lengthy stretch of time.
CTV vet creates Hilltops in video game form
The @SaskHilltops on PS4! Created roster & uniforms! Check it out & the TD pass 2 Connor Graham #cjfl #yxe #hilltops pic.twitter.com/PAgfiWRYz4— Matt Young (@MattYoungCTV) November 6, 2019
Matt Young might be best known as an on-air talent for CTV
in Saskatoon, but what most don’t know is he is a video game guru and connoisseur.
On Wednesday, Young put out a tweet to show he created the
21-time CJFL champion Saskatoon Hilltops on a PlayStation 4 game called “Doug
Flutie’s Maximum Football 2019.” The game includes Canadian teams and allows for
customization.
Young put in the time
on the customization feature to create the Hilltops with their current roster. The video Young posted sees the Hilltops taking on their provincial rivals the
Regina Thunder.
You see plays of Hilltops star power running back Ben Abrook
running with the ball. You see quarterback Tyler Hermann hit receiver Dillan
Heintz with a deep pass.
Hermann also connects with receiver Connor Graham on a deep
post route for a touchdown that is caught in the back of a 20-yard deep end
zone.
Hilltops kicker/receiver Rylan Kleiter nails a convert from
the professional football spot at 32 yards out.
Of course, you can’t go to your nearest video game story and
purchase this game with the Hilltops already installed. If you want to put in
the time that Young did into customizing a team, you can plays as the storied
CJFL club in video game form.
You can bet anyone associated with the Hilltops will get a
kick out of this video.
A reset for the CJFL?
Roberts has been overseeing a podcast called Dieters CJFL Podcast and a blog under that same name. On Wednesday, Roberts put together a post entitled, “Time for the CJFL to press reset.”
In the piece, Roberts makes a well thought out case for why
the CJFL should move from being a 22-and-under league to a 20-and-under league.
Part of the argument centres around creating more competitive games and positioning the CJFL as mainly a feeder
league for the Canadian university football programs in U Sports.
Roberts, when he was still the vice-president of the BCFC,
made a presentation at the CJFL annual general meeting a year ago in Saskatoon
on the merits of making an age change.
I am just putting both things out there for readers to think
about hopefully with an open mind. The link to Roberts piece from Wednesday can
be found by clicking right here.
The link to the paper of his presentation at the 2018 CJFL
annual general meeting can be found by clicking right here.
I will admit I am intrigued by the outside the box thinking,
and I welcome it.
Knowing how people in today’s world like to overact, I must
note these are ideas that are put forward. The CJFL will not be changing its age
rules tomorrow just because ideas are put forward.
With how politics works generally in Canada’s amateur sports
world, changes usually happen at a medium to slow pace.
Both of Roberts’ pieces talk about working with U Sports in
order to create a better development football system for Canada. My concern
there is that if you do get the CJFL clubs to agree on an age change, I am not
certain what type of motivation there would be on the U Sports side of things
to work with the CJFL.
When you deal with U Sports, you are not just dealing with
the athletic departments at each school. You will ultimately deal with the
academic institutions themselves.
You can never predict where the politics of the academic
institutions will take things, and it is possible an academic who is a
university head will spin something in a direction to prevent any cooperation
from happening.
For now, Roberts put together a well thought out plan that
he believes can make things better for the CJFL and football in Canada. Time
will tell if these ideas do get any traction and become something more.
Right now, this is likely something only the
ultra-passionate CJFL followers will have taken a look at.
If you have any comments
you would like to pass along about this post, feel free to email them to stankssports@gmail.com.
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