Too many COVID-19 challenges for Canadian
university sport
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| The Huskies have fun at a victory rally on March 11. |
On that Sunday fun day at TD Place in Ottawa, Ont., the Huskies downed the Brock University Badgers 82-64 to capture the Bronze Baby trophy as U Sports champions. The Huskies claimed their first title in March of 2016.
Fifth-year veteran players Megan Ahlstrom, Vera Crooks and
Sabine Dukate graduated as members of both championship winning teams.
As a
collective, that trio was part of a talented Huskies team made up of players
who were all-star persons like Janaya Brown, Libby Epoch, Summer Masikewich,
Katriana Philipenko and Kyla Shand.
They were
all guided by player-first head coach Lisa Thomaidis, who one of the best
coaches in Canada when it comes to all sports.
After
beating the Badgers, the Huskies celebrated with the euphoria that is
association with a lifetime achievement of a national championship win.
There were no thoughts of things like the coronavirus (COVID-19) or the idea of a pandemic.
On March 11, the Huskies were front centre of a lunch time victory rally at the Physical Activity Complex at the U of Saskatchewan.
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| Huskies team members sign autographs for young fans. |
At that
rally, there was chatter about COVID-19, but everyone at that time was still
living life like normal and soaking in big accomplishments. No one knew that
sports postponements starting with the NBA later that day, sports cancellations
and implementation of restrictive government measures to combat the COVID-19
pandemic were about to go into full swing over the next handful of days.
Now just
over seven months of living under the spectre of the COVID-19 pandemic that has
gripped the world, the 2020-21 U Sports season has been put to bed before it
really had a chance to get going.
On Thursday, U Sports announced all its winter national championships for the 2020-21 campaign have been cancelled, and combined with the cancellations that have already happened, U Sports will not be crowning any national champions in the 2020-21 season.
The impacted events included men’s and women’s championships in basketball, hockey, swimming, track and field, volleyball and wrestling. Curling Canada had previously announced the Canadian university championships had been suspended.
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| Bailee Bourassa jets up ice for the Huskies. |
“Therefore,
U Sports is in the unfortunate position where we are unable to offer the 2021
winter championships.”
In
conjunction with the U Sports announcement, all four conferences made their own
announcements with regards to their winter sports.
The Canada
West Conference cancelled all regular season, post-season events for the
2020-21 campaign in men’s and women’s basketball, volleyball, hockey and
wrestling along with women’s rugby 7s. Decisions on staging Canada West
Championships in curling, track and field and swimming have been deferred to an
undetermined later date.
Canada West
previously cancelled all fall team competition on June 8 and the Canada West
Golf Championship on September 22.
Canada West
will allow member programs to explore competitive opportunities for
student-athletes based on the principle of regional cohort play.
Canada West had set November 2 as the date for deciding the fate of winter semester competition, but the fact all the U Sports national champion cancellations came out on Thursday changed that approach.
Ontario
University Athletics announced the cancellation of all OUA-sanctioned sport
programming and championships up to March 31, 2021.
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| Collin Shirley speeds up ice for the Huskies. |
Atlantic
University Sport announced it plans to release return to play options by the
middle of November regarding regional competition scenarios.
The
Atlantic provinces have had success conducting sports in a bubble between themselves.
Out of all
the announcements, the Canada West Conference release got to the bottom of why
the cancellations were made.
Canada West
cited reasons for the cancellations in its release including health and safety
of student-athletes and others, rising case numbers in portions of Western
Canada particularly in the age group of university students, continued
interprovincial travel restrictions imposed by provincial health authorities
and financial impediments to traditional conference competition due to COVID-19
protocols including heightened travel costs.
Those
reasons can basically be applied to all U Sports conferences and the U Sports
overseeing body itself as the chief reasons for the cancellations that have
been made.
The only thing that could be added is that U Sports governing bodies have made decisions at fairly early junctures so students can make decisions with regards to living arrangements. Most universities in Canada have gone to online classes for the 2020-21 campaign, and for the athletes that don’t live in the centre their post-secondary institution is located, they can save some money on living expenses.
Since the
COVID-19 pandemic started to really grip the world in the middle of March,
anyone observing U Sports since that time could have reasonably expected these
cancellations were likely to come down.
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| The Huskies men’s hockey team enjoys a Canada West title win. |
Inevitably,
there will be people out there that won’t like the cancellations that were made
in U Sports.
At this
point, the hands of the decision makers in U Sports were tied. They made the
only reasonable choice they could.
Now, the
focus should be on individual programs to preserve teams, so there is something
for athletes to return to when the COVID-19 pandemic ends.
Raiders’ Wiesblatt signs with NHL’s Sharks,
other notes
Ozzy Wiesblatt took another big step in realizing his NHL dream.
Back on October 6, the 18-year-old right-winger from the WHL’s Prince Albert Raiders was selected in the first round and 31st overall by the San Jose Sharks in the NHL Entry Draft.
On Friday, the Sharks signed Wiesblatt to a three-year NHL entry-level contract.
“Ozzy brings speed, playmaking and offence to the lineup, which makes it difficult to play against a talented skater like him,” said Sharks general manager Doug Wilson in a release. “His tenacity for the puck paired with his ability to retain possession and drive the offensive side of the game, along with his character on and off the ice, makes him a valuable player for our organization.”
The Sharks selection of Wiesblatt was one of the big highlights of the entire NHL Entry Draft.
The NHL Entry Draft was held in via video conference call from the NHL Network
Studios in Secaucus, New Jersey, as opposed to being live in an NHL centre due
to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. As a result, most players that were
drafted watched the proceedings from their home on TV.
The TV
broadcast had the use of Internet cameras to get live looks into the home of
all of the players taken in the first round and some of the players that were
taken in the rounds afterwards.
Doug Wilson
Jr., who is the Sharks director of scouting, announced the pick using American
Sign Language and his voice that his club had picked Wiesblatt.
The picture
cut away to a picture of the Wiesblatt household in Calgary, Alta., which was a
scene of a euphoric and joyous celebration.
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| Ozzy Wiesblatt as 70 points last season for the Raiders. |
She had to
raise Ozzy, his three brothers and one sister as a single mom since 2014.
Ozzy’s brothers are all high level hockey players.
On top of
the heartwarming Wiesblatt family story, Ozzy can play.
Last season
as a 17-year-old sophomore with the Raiders, Wiesblatt, who stands 5-foot-10
and weighs 182 pounds, appeared in 64 regular season games finishing second in
team scoring with 25 goals, 45 assists and a plus-20 rating. He helped the
Raiders post a 36-18-6-4 record and finish first in the WHL’s East Division for
the second straight year.
As a
16-year-old rookie in 2018-19, Wiesblatt suited up in 64 regular season games
posting 15 goals, 24 assists and a plus-30 rating. By the end of that season,
Wiesblatt often found himself on a line with star overage centre Noah Gregor
and star left-winger Cole Fonstad as the Raiders topped the WHL regular season
standings with a 54-10-2-2 record.
Wiesblatt
played in all of the Raiders 23 games in the WHL playoffs posting five goals, five
assists and a plus-six rating helping deliver a WHL championship to “Hockey
Town North” for the second time in history.
Wiesblatt
deserved to sign an NHL Entry Level contract, which provided another tribute
for the hard work put in by him and his family.
- On Wednesday, the Western Hockey League
announced it pushed the announced start of its regular season from Dec. 4
to January 8, 2020. Teams will play exclusively in the boundaries of each
of the four divisions with the Swift Current Broncos moving from the
Central Division into the East Division. All WHL players are slated to
report to their teams following the Christmas break. All of these
developments are due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
- On Tuesday, Saskatoon StarPhoenix sports
writer Darren Zary wrote about the journey second-year guard Claudia Lomba
Viana made from her home in Lisbon, Portugal, to Saskatoon to rejoin the U
of Saskatchewan Huskies women’s basketball team. The piece included Lomba
Viana’s experience being in quarantine for 14 days during these COVID-19
pandemic times. Zary’s piece can be found by clicking right here.
- On Wednesday, BC Hockey announced the
cancellation of all 16 of its minor hockey championships in 2021 due to
the COVID-19 pandemic. BC Hockey partners with host districts and
associations to operate and facilitate these championships across BC and
the Yukon Territories in the under-21, under-18, under-15 and under-13 age
categories.
- On Wednesday, the QMJHL announced the 12 teams
located in the province of Quebec have
had their games postponed until October 28. At the time of that announcement,
six of those clubs in Quebec were located in red zones that have been shut
down by government restrictions. As for the six teams in the Maritime
provinces, the Moncton Wildcats weekend games have been postponed due to
government authorities in New Brunswick declaring Moncton an orange zone.
The Wildcats are limited to practising.
- On Thursday, CTV News in Ottawa reported
five member of the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees football team tested
positive for COVID-19 and the team’s training had been suspended until
further notice. While the U Sports football season has been cancelled,
teams are still allowed to train.
- On Friday, the Alberta Colleges Athletic
Conference announced it was withdrawing from participation in all Canadian
College Athletic Association National Championships for the 2020-21
campaign due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The ACAC announced it was
continuing to explore options to hold post-secondary athletics in the
winter and spring semesters in 2021.
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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