When Antoinette Ntambwe pulls on her light blue Université de Mon-tréal Carabins volleyball jersey this fall, it will mark the peak point of an unlikely journey.

Ntambwe will become the first member of her large family to play varsity volleyball – a sport none of them really knew before she took it up – and the first of eight siblings to study at university.

And as the Grade 12 Fran-co-Ouest high school student looks ahead to the next step, she’s got one message to all those who helped bring the opportunity to life: thank you.

“I have so many people supporting me out there. I have coaches, teach-ers, friends, family, and my community itself,” Ntambwe underlines. “I’d like to thank them for always believing in me. Pushing me to work harder, fight harder, and encouraging me to my full potential, for supporting me through everything – injuries, financially, emo-tionally – I mean everything.

“If it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t play varsity volleyball, I wouldn’t achieve my goals, and I wouldn’t be the athlete I am today.”

When Ntambwe told her father that she’d be going to U de M, he broke into a smile as wide as she’s seen. For a single father of five who works at a garage in Gatineau, his daughter’s news was music to his ears.

The Ntambwes live in the Britan-nia Woods Ottawa Community Hous-ing neighbourhood, which comes with an inherent set of barriers to reach-

ing objectives such as a university volleyball career. But despite the chal-lenges, the second-eldest sibling says she’s always enjoyed the atmosphere at home with her three sisters and brother.

“It’s pretty crowded, but it’s just really fun being able to play with them,” smiles Ntambwe, who has an-other three half-sisters in Toronto. “I can never get bored.”

Ntambwe has overcome the odds at many turns. Most recently, it was with her Franco-Ouest Vikings, who placed just 6th in the national cap-ital tier 1 regular season standings but went on to beat four playoff op-ponents and win the high school city championship on March 1.

That Ntambwe ever played vol-leyball in the first place was purely by chance.

As a Grade 4 St-François-d’Assise student in Hintonburg, Ntambwe had a group of friends who all enjoyed sports, but volleyball was one she’d never really tried.

“One day during lunch they all wanted to go tryout for the volleyball team and I didn’t want to be left be-hind,” Ntambwe recounts.

By Dan Plouffe

Ritchie Street Star

Antoinette Ntambwe, who lives in the Britannia Woods Ottawa Community Housing neighbourhood, has fought

through financial challenges to earn a chance to play university volleyball.

She has an online fundraising page at:gofundme.com/antoinettentambwe

Volleyball player over-comes the odds in sign-ing with powerhouse Université de Montréal

photo: dan plouffe

P.10How come your Ottawa Sportspage looks different this month? Read our editorial to find out why.

NEW LOOK FOR SPORTSPAGE

NTAMBWE continues on p.4

March 2016 Your Not-for-Profit Voice for Local Community Sport SportsOttawa.com

P.3Former world #1 wrestler Erica Wiebe punches her ticket to the Rio 2016 Olympics at Pan Am qualifier.

I’M A BE-WIEBER!

P.8The nation’s capital hosted a pile of major cross-country ski events this past month.

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2

Rebelles Wrap

Établi en 2005, le programme de Sports- Études à l’École secondaire publique Louis- Riel continue d’être chef de file en matière d’excellence sportive et académique pour ses élèves -athlètes.

« On a eu le courage de bonifier le système d’éducation, indique Ken Levesque, le coordonnateur du programme Sports-Études. Toutes les recherches démontrent que l’activité physique et le succès académique vont en-semble, donc on voulait prouver ça à tout le monde. »

QU’EST -CE QUE LE PROGRAMME SPORTS- ÉTUDES?

Innovateur et avant -gardiste, le programme S -É of-fre un juste milieu entre les sports et les études. Les élèves débutent leurs journées avec trois cours de 75 minutes en avant -midi. L’après- midi, une journée sur deux, ils ont une période d’entraînement physique où ils suivent un programme personnalisé dans leur discipline choisie. L’autre journée, ils pratiquent leur sport: l’athlétisme, le basketball, le hockey, le ski alpin, le soccer, le volleyball, d’autres sports individuels tels la gymnastique, le patinage artistique, l’équitation, la lutte que pour en nommer quelques- uns. D’ailleurs, une nouvelle Académie Internationale de hockey déb-utera l’automne prochain.

L’école respecte bien les exigences requises pour la haute performance dans le sport et s’adapte selon les besoins de chaque élève -athlète. Par exemple, la majorité des enseignants utilisent des plate -formes informatisées et disposent toutes les notes de cours, les travaux et le contenu en ligne pour qu’un élève puisse se rattraper pendant qu’il ou elle est parti à une compétition. Donc, le modèle est très flexible et est à l’écoute de chacun.

« Je trouve que notre système d’éducation ne ré-pond pas toujours aux besoins des athlètes. Ils ont

besoin du temps nécessaire pour pratiquer leur sport à un haut niveau sans négliger leurs études, affirme Levesque. Nous voulons vraiment nous assurer que l’élève est bien encadré académiquement pour pouvoir pratiquer son sport à un haut niveau. »

Les entraîneurs, tous des enseignants au secondaire, aident à coordonner leur emploi du temps et à mettre en place un plan qui permet et encourage le succès académique. La majorité des athlètes visent l’université pour pouvoir étudier et continuer leurs exploits sportifs.

« Ça m’a beaucoup aidé le programme Sports- Études, signale Abdou Samaké, un élève de 12e année qui jouera au soccer pour l’Université du Michigan dès cet automne. J’ai appris comment gérer mon temps adéquatement pour pouvoir faire mes études et le sport en même temps et de me préparer justement pour l’université. »

Le programme inclut également des ateliers de nu-trition et de psychologie sportive tout en profitant de divers partenariats dans la communauté.

L’une des meilleures installations sportives en Amérique du nord, le Dôme de Louis -Riel permet la pratique multidisciplinaire durant toute l’année avec sa piste de 400 m et un grand terrain de sport intérieur. Il y a aussi une salle de musculation de première classe et une clinique de physiothérapie privée.

La combinaison a fait ses preuves: la moitié des 500 élèves au secondaire sont inscrits au programme Sports- Études. À l’intermédiaire, deux tiers des élèves inscrits participent au programme Sports- Exploratoires (où ils pratiquent une variété de sports pour apprendre les outils de base selon le modèle de développement long terme des athlètes).

« C’est une petite école. Tout le monde se connaît, rajoute Levesque. C’est vraiment comme faire partie d’une grande famille ici à Louis- Riel. Une fois que tu es Rebelle, tu es Rebelle pour toujours. »

Louis-Riel high school has become an innovator in the pursuit of athletic and aca-demic excellence, and con-tinues to push that leading position as its sports-études (sports-study) program enters

its second decade of operation.“We had the courage to change the education sys-

tem a little bit,” indicates Ken Levesque, the sports-études program coordinator. “All the research shows that physical activity and academic success are linked, so we wanted to show everyone that that’s the case.”

WHAT IS SPORTS–ÉTUDES?The innovative program – which has attracted

a number of anglophone students to study in the French-language public school – finds the ideal balance between sports and school. Students in the program begin their day with three 75-minute classes in the morning. In the afternoon, half the time they’ll have a physical conditioning period where they fol-low personal training programs individually tailored to excel in their specific sports. The other half, they practice their sport, chosen amongst hockey (with a new International Academy set to debut this fall), soccer, track-and-field, basketball, volleyball, ski, or other individual sports such as gymnastics, figure skating, wrestling or equestrian, to name a few.

The program schedule is far from inflexible, Levesque underlines. The school fully understands and embraces what’s required to excel at a high level in sport, and adapts according to student-ath-letes’ needs. For example, many courses are avail-able online, and most teachers post their class notes and homework for students and parents to consult – so a student who’s away at a competition

can easily stay on top of their schoolwork.“I find that our school system doesn’t always meet

athletes’ needs. They need the time to train for their sport at a high level without neglecting their studies,” Levesque notes. “Here, we really make sure our stu-dents are well-supported academically so that they can excel in their sports.”

The program’s coaches – all also high school teachers – help coordinate students’ busy schedules and implement a plan for scholastic success. The goal for the vast majority of students is to move on to post-secondary studies and continue their athletic careers at university or college.

“The sports-études program really helped me a lot,” signals Grade 12 student Abdou Samaké, who’s headed to the University of Michigan on a soccer schol-arship this fall. “I learned how to manage my time so that I could handle both school and sports commit-ments, and prepare myself sure enough for university.”

Sports nutrition and psychology sessions are also part of the program, which takes advantage of nu-merous community partnerships as well.

One of North America’s premiere facilities, the Louis-Riel Dome features a 400-metre track, a mul-tidisciplinary sports field, a top-of-the-line weight-room, and a private physiotherapy clinic on site.

It’s proven to be a popular combination: almost half of the school’s 500 high school students are part of sports-études, while roughly two-thirds of 200 middle school students are in the sports exploration program (where they take part in a variety of sports to build their basic athletic skills, in accordance with Long-Term Athlete Development philosophies).

“It’s a small school where everybody knows each other,” Levesque highlights. “It’s really like being part of a big family here at Louis-Riel. Once you’re a Rebelle, you’re a Rebelle for life.”

Louis-Riel HS: Ideal for athletes serious about sports & studies

É.S.P. Louis-Riel: idéale pour les élèves dévoués aux sports et aux études

www.louis-riel.cepeo.on.ca/sports-etudesCAMPSSUMMER

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Fun and gymnasticsfor Active Kids!We offer 10 weeks of full day and half day summer programs for children 4-12 years of age. No gymnastics experience is necessary! Our NCCP certi�ed coaching staff deliver an exciting weekly program of themed activties that will keep your child active while developing new gymnastics skills.

Full Day Camp (age 4+) 9am-4pm- 3 hours of gymnastics daily in our fully equipped gym- Fun & exciting themed activities each week- Pre-care and post-care included from 7:30am to 5:30pm- Free camp t-shirt with a full week registration- Pizza lunch on Friday

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Sam Zakutney is a Cana-dian champion. That statement has been true for about seven years ever since he burst onto the youth gymnastics high-per-formance scene, but in Feb-ruary, for the first time, the 17-year-old Ottawa Gymnastics Centre athlete earned a na-tional crown at the senior level, winning the parallel bars event final at Elite Canada in Halifax.

“It’s very cool,” smiles Za-kutney, who also placed 5th all-around, including 2nd on floor and again on top for par-allel bars. “It’s nice that I won’t have to clarify that I’m the best junior, you know, between the age of 14 and 17 – now I can say I’m actually one of the best guys in Canada.”

Long considered a 2020 Olympic prospect, the Fran-co-Cité high school senior’s standout performances have raised the possibility that Zak-utney might make it to the Rio 2016 Olympics as a teenager.

“I do have a small chance,” indicates the the Penn State-bound athlete who also on the floor event against 35 NCAA

gymnasts at a Minnesota event in February. “(Last season), I wasn’t thinking about it at all.”

Zakutney was 3rd nation-ally as a junior last year, but opened the eyes of the senior national team coaches at an August training camp. when the seniors were preparing for the World Championships and he was about to head to Japan for a top junior international meet in Japan.

At a practice competition, Zakutney produced the 2nd-best all-around score out of everyone, junior or senior.

Zakutney says he won’t be on the Canadian team that will compete in April’s Olympic qual-ifier in Rio de Janeiro because he’s headed to the Pacific Rim Championships in Everett, WA that month instead, but has a shot to join the lineup should his Canadian teammates snag one of four available Olympic berts at the qualifier.

“Knowing that I have a small chance, I’d rather just strive to make it happen,” Za-kutney underlines.

Rio berth possible for new Elite Canada champ– ELITE –

Sam Zakutney.

photo: steve kingsman

By Dan Plouffe

ELITE CANADA cont’s p.3

3

There were plenty of twists and turns on Erica Wiebe’s road to the Olympics, but with tickets to Rio 2016 on the line, it was only the Stittsville wrestler’s opponents who were twisting and turning.

Wiebe controlled rivals from Venezuela, Pu-erto Rico, Cuba and Mexico to win all four of her matches in the women’s 75 kg division on March 4 at the Pan American Olympic Qualifier in Texas.

“Today, it feels more real,” an ecstatic Wiebe said the day after qualifying for her first Olympic Games. “To be able to compete in the ultimate honour in sport, getting a chance to represent my country on the biggest stage there is, just to be able to do that, it’s awesome.”

Wiebe clearly established herself as a threat for the 2016 Olympic podium in 2014 when she won the Commonwealth Games gold medal and reached the #1 world ranking.

The 26-year-old was dominant in the 2015 season as well, boasting a 37-2 overall record, but both of her losses came to Canadian rival Justina Di Stasio. That included a heartbreaking nationals defeat that robbed Wiebe of a chance to compete at a home Pan Am Games in Toronto as well as the 2015 World Championships.

“It was a tough year for me,” the University of Calgary-based athlete noted. “But I didn’t want to dwell on what happened in the past. I was focused on getting to the Olympics and to do that I had to move forward.”

Wiebe was able to get the monkey off her back so to speak when she finally defeated Di Stasio comfortably at the Canadian Olympic Team Trials in December. The fact that one of Wiebe’s top rivals in the world comes from next door in B.C. speaks

to the strength of women’s wrestling in Canada. Wiebe and three female teammates displayed that prowess in full force in Texas, each winning their divisions to fill all six Olympic weight classes with Canadians (the two others having previously quali-fied through the World Championships).

“It just reinforces what we have known all along,” Wiebe underlined. “We have so much depth.”

OTTAWA PROUDFrom the first time she was exposed to wrest-

ling at Sacred Heart Catholic High School, to her developmental days with the National Capital Wrestling Club, and then on to Calgary to master her craft, Wiebe says she’s enjoyed a strong sup-port system around her all along.

“I wouldn’t have stuck with the sport if it weren’t for so many amazing people,” highlighted the former Ottawa Fury soccer player who also placed 2nd to current world champion Adeline Gray of USA at a strong late-January Olympic test event in Rio.

The childhood dream comes true: wrestler Wiebe is Olympics-bound

By Anil Jhalli Erica Wiebe won the 75 kg class at the Pan Am Olympic qualifier.

His focus right now is on improving the consistency of his routines and perhaps adding a bit of difficulty.

“I’m still young. I’m not at the fullest of my capabilities, so if I don’t make it, it’s really not that big a deal,” Zakutney explains. “But if I do, that’d be pretty awesome.”

Also competing in the senior high-per-formance division at Elite Canada on the women’s side was Sofia Baggio. Though a disappointing competition for the 15-year-old Kanata gymnast overall, the vault event provided a major high when she fin-ished within half a point of Pan Am Games triple-gold medallist Ellie Black (27.225 to 26.875 points in the combined standings).

TUMBLERS RETURN TO NATSIt was a bit of an up-and-down Elite

Canada for Tumblers Gymnastics Centre’s Avery Rosales and Juliette Chapman as well, or rather down-then-up.

The novice athletes had a rough first day of competition and found themselves squarely behind the 8-ball in their lone chance to secure a Canadian Champion-ships high-performance class berth, but came through on the second day to secure their second straight trip to nationals.

“I knew I had to make a better day to qualify for nationals,” signals Rosales, who tried to push all the “what-ifs?” from her mind. “I just tried to think about what I did in training and the good routines that I’d done – to think more positively, and not put too much pressure on myself.”

Rosales wound up 15th in the com-bined all-around standings, while Chapman slipped in just under the cut line in 24th.

“I’m most proud of my second day,” Chapman highlights. “I got to improve a lot

of skills that weren’t the best on the first day, and I made the skills that were good even better.”

Rosales and Chapman have progressed side-by-side in the gymnastics world, shar-ing fun times traveling to different corners of Canada for gymnastics (Halifax most recently, and Trois-Rivières and Edmonton before that).

The 13-year-old Tumblers have always been very similar in terms of their talent, development and even results – so much so that coach Alina Florea talks about them collectively (i.e. balance beam has always been strong for “us,” but “we” have to im-prove “our” uneven bars). At Elite Canada, floor was indeed the strongest event for both, with Rosales placing 2nd and Chap-man 4th in their first-day flights.

“It’s a team,” Florea notes. “We train as a team, and yes, they compete against each other in training because they look at each other and how they progress. If someone achieves a skill, the other one is looking, and learning, and they get motivated.”

GYMNIX GLORY FOR GYMNASTS

Tumblers also enjoyed a number of standout results at the massive Gymnix In-ternational meet March 3-6 in Montreal. Along with Chapman’s 5th-place all-around showing in the Novice National category, Hanna Nixon also hit the all-around podium with her 2nd-place finish in Aspire 2 (with vault & beam bronze) and Hayley McMeekin won Level 6 silver (with vault & floor silver).

Also at Gymnix, OGC’s Sarah Hu and Si-enna White won their respective L9 and L6 categories, Laura Palmer was 2nd and Ma-disson Kelleher-Radey 3rd in their L7 ses-sions, while Sophie Ludington was 3rd in L6.

ELITE CANADA: Ups & downs for local gymnasts

Local gymnasts Emma Christie and Emilia Potochnyak won nothing but gold – five medals apiece in total – in front of a home crowd as the Ottawa Gymnastics Centre hosted a wo-men’s artistic gymnastics Ontario Championships qualification event from Feb. 26-28.

For Christie, sweeping all four apparatuses and the all-around title in the Level 9, Age 15+ cat-egory was “surprising” – a feat the OGC athlete hadn’t achieved since back in her Level 6 days.

“There are a lot of people who came to watch and it was pretty loud when they cheered,” notes Christie, explaining that was one possible ingredient in her suc-cess. “It also might have been the adrenaline and competing on home equipment, which was nice, but I’d like to think it was mostly hard work (in training).”

This April will be the first Ontario Championships of Po-tochnyak’s career, and first ever for her Kanata GymnoSphere club, a new club in its first year of operation.

Potochnyak previously com-peted provincially in Quebec for

Unigym Gatineau, but the Hull resident followed her coach out to Kanata (often a 45-minute journey to get to 4 p.m. practice) and is now enjoying her new sur-roundings.

“I made a lot of new friends this year,” notes Potochnyak, 14. “I like the club. I like the atmo-sphere. The equipment is really great. And the people there are cheering for each other.”

The Level 10, Age 11-14 competitor is targeting a top-6

finish at provincials in order to make Team Ontario at nationals, and her first-ever all-gold sweep was a certainly an encouraging step in that pursuit.

“I just wanted to do my best,” Potochnyak says of her pre-com-petition objectives, but “was ex-cited and proud of myself” when she learned the results.

Other local gymnasts earned a pile of medals at the qualifier as well. See SportsOttawa.com for a list of all-around medallists.

Golden sweep for 2 local gymnasts at home qualifier– COMMUNITY SPORTS & ELITE –

A severe back injury turned Adrianka Forrest’s world upside down last year.

But now the national-level athlete is back. Read her story at SportsOttawa.com photo: dan plouffe

By Dan Plouffe

photo: steve

kingsman

WIEBE continues on p.10

A driving force be-hind the sport’s presence locally dating back to the 1960s, Peter Lawrence has watched a lot of water polo from the pool deck at Carleton University. But this year’s Titans Cup offered something new for – it was the first time the Ottawa Ti-tans club welcomed a team from New Brunswick for the annual tournament, now in its second decade of exist-ence.

To help ease the financial hit of travel and accommod-ations for their eastern vis-itors, “the players and their parents all came and stayed with our families,” Lawrence highlights.

“It was very exciting,” adds the ‘I Love Water Polo’ program coach. “The young-sters had some fabulous ex-periences.”

For the young players who competed in under-12 and U14 mixed-gender divi-sions, the news that they’d be hosting water polo play-ers from New Brunswick was exciting.

“I was really surprised,

and kind of nervous,” in-dicates Maria Vukojevic, adding the tension evapor-ated quickly once she and her guest got to know each other. “She was a really nice girl, and we both really love water polo.”

Jackson Taylor says he enjoyed meeting people from another part of the country.

“It was really fun,” signals the 11-year-old. “The only other place I know people from Canada is Quebec.”

The Atlantic Canada water polo league has just three clubs, so the compet-ition provided the chance to get a taste for the level of play outside their region. Tournaments like the Titans Cup are “exceedingly import-

ant” for players’ develop-ment, Lawrence underlines.

“They grow from there and can get into the upper echelons,” he notes, point-ing out coach Yorek Hurrel-mann, a past Titans national champion and Pan Am junior bronze medallist for Canada.

“Most of the players on my team, this was their first tournament,” echoes Vuko-jevic, a U12 player. “But at the end of the day, I realized they’d really improved on their defence.”

The Kitchener-Waterloo Black team was the class of the U14 competition, win-ning each of their games by no less than 6 goals, includ-ing the 9-1 final against the Titans Gold group.

Local polo tourney hosts New Brunswick team

photo: dan plouffe

By Dan Plouffe

4 – ELITE –

Last year she won the Kristina Groves Female Athlete of the Year Trophy from the Ottawa Sports Awards, and now Ivanie Blondin has replicated another feat Groves achieved in her legendary speed skat-ing career: she’s a world champ.

On the final day of the Feb. 11-14 ISU World Single Distance Speed Skat-ing Championships in Russia, Blondin won the women’s mass start event to capture the first world title of her career.

“It was my goal this season to be world champion in the mass start,” in-dicated the 25-year-old. “Finishing 2nd last year gave me the motivation this year to go get the title for Canada, for me, for my coach and for my team-mate, Josie Spence, who wasn’t there with me today but pushed me physic-ally and mentally all year to perform.”

It was the first international vic-tory of the season for Blondin and her first podium since December’s World Cup mass start bronze medal in the Netherlands. Since then, Blondin had struggled, including day one of the worlds when she placed just 17th in the 3,000 m.

“I couldn’t be happier. I had a tough time mentally and physically last month, but this race is just the cherry on top of the cake,” the Gloucester Concordes-brewed athlete added in a Speed Skating Canada media release. “It was a very tough race, a battle from start to finish.”

Another Concordes product, 20-year-old Isabelle Weidemann, also enjoyed a career breakthrough mo-ment by finishing 5th in the 5,000 m and 10th in the 3,000 m at the worlds.

“I definitely could not have pre-dicted this at the start of the season,” the 20-year-old acknowledged. “Being a first-year senior you’re out there kind of trying to figure out where you sit and how to deal with all of the pressure, and not just training to get better, but training to perform as well.”

Weidemann is less than two years removed from surgery to reattach ten-dons in her ankle – the result of a high school steeplechase race – which con-tinued to hamper her last season and eventually forced her to withdraw after 2 of 5 races at the world juniors.

The Colonel By Secondary School grad spent the early portion of this season simply trying to claw her way up from the World Cup’s ’B’ division be-fore the explosion at the World Cham-pionships.

“After missing that summer, this past one was the first time I had the chance to put in a real solid base of training,” recounted Weidemann, a second-year University of Calgary stu-dent. “I think a lot of us, especially as athletes, go through lots of waves of doubt, but I think with the help of a new coach and getting better technically, I was able to learn and grow a lot.”

Signs of Weidemann’s growth came into sharp focus at the early-January Canadian Champion-ships when she beat Blondin in the 3,000 m for her first senior national title. She then won the 5,000 m as well.

It was a relatively short time ago, in 2014, that Blondin was welcoming Weidemann to the national team train-ing centre at the Calgary Olympic Oval.

“Ivanie reached out and contac-ted me, and let me know if I needed anything to let her know,” Weidemann recalled. “Especially as a younger ath-

lete, someone like her telling you that makes you feel like getting to their level isn’t unattainable and makes you real-ize they’re just normal people too.”

DE HAITRE HITS NEW HIGH

The third local competitor at the worlds, Vincent De Haitre, also matched his Concordes mates with a career-best international finish in the men’s 1,500 m, placing 6th.

“I was pretty happy with it, and a little surprised, because my best so far this year was 9th in the 1,500, and that was one a really good race for me,” the 21-year-old highlighted. “(Worlds) was one of the race plans I executed exactly the way I wanted to.”

De Haitre also finished 8th in the 1,000 m at the worlds, but would like to improve on that result in his strongest event and break into the top-5 for the March 11-13 World Cup Final in the Netherlands.

Ranked 8th for the 1,000 m and 11th in 1,500 on the World Cup cir-cuit, the youngest member of Canada’s 2014 Olympic speed skating team has solidified his spot as one of the world’s elite speed skaters this season.

“I mean, the goal is always 1st for everyone,” De Haitre indicated. “But for now in my career and seeing how far I’ve come in the short period of time I’ve been on the national team, I think it’s something to be proud of and I definitely look forward to doing better.”

3 speed skaters hit career bests at worldsBy Mat LaBranche Ivanie Blondin won the first

world title of her career in the women’s mass start.

photo: isu

She immediately impressed her coaches with her athleticism, energy, and height. “Since that day, I really star-ted liking volleyball.”

It was at Samuel-Genest high school that volleyball became a more seri-ous pursuit. Coach Laurent Crévieaux helped Ntambwe find her way in an unknown volleyball world. She joined the Maverick Volleyball Club for her 15-and-under season, devoting many hours to practice, drills, video analysis and tournaments.

“I spend all my time playing volley-ball,” Ntambwe indicates. “I just love the game, meeting new people, and being able to grow as an athlete.”

The biggest highlight in her volley-ball career thus far came last sum-mer when she earned a spot on Team Ontario for the National Team Challenge Cup in B.C. – 1 of only 2 local players to make it (along with Université Laval-bound Émie Gaboury, a fellow Mav).

“It was like, ‘Wow, all the hard work paid off,’” Ntambwe reflects.

Another major accomplishment came to fruition in February when the 5’ 9” outside hitter signed to play with the Montréal Carabins, the perennial Quebec conference powerhouses.

U de M was a perfect fit – on top of the quality volleyball and school pro-grams, the Montreal-born athlete will be just two hours from home and will live with her aunt while paying low Que-bec resident tuition rates.

“I’m really excited,” says Ntambwe, who plans to study psychology or crim-inology. “That was one of my goals since 7th grade. I always wanted to play varsity volleyball.”

BACK-TO-BACK INJURIES

It hasn’t been an easy road to get there. Last year, a torn knee ligament sidelined her, and then she suffered a torn labrum in her hitting shoulder – about the worst injury possible for a volleyball player – to knock her out even longer. Ntambwe finally returned in early December.

“She’s a hard worker,” underlines Colin Walker, Ntambwe’s coach with the Mavericks. “She’s dedicated to her sport for sure. She deals with adversity well and she’s persevered through a lot of injuries, persevered in terms of just trying to get to practice, and deal-ing with all those things coming from a single-parent family with lots of kids.”

Developing university-calibre vol-leyball skills doesn’t come cheap. Walker pegs the total cost somewhere between $20,000 and $30,000 – $4,000+ per year for team fees, then there are additional travel-related ex-penses like a flight to Vancouver to play for Team Ontario.

Ntambwe has managed to pay scrape together the necessary funds thanks to personal sponsors from the volleyball community, her club itself, and grants from charities such as Kid-Sport and Canadian Tire’s JumpStart.

She’s got an online gofundme ac-count, she’s held fundraisers at school, and she helps run Mavs camps to off-set some of her fees. Ntambwe also works for Britannia Woods Community House as a youth counsellor – a role

she thoroughly enjoys because she gets to see kids she’s known since as young as age 2 grow up.

“I’ve always told her, ‘Contribute what you can,’” Walker notes. “‘Make the effort. But don’t ever worry that you can’t play because of money. That’s never going to be the situation. We’ll find a way to make it work.’”

Parents of other players will ar-range to drive Ntambwe to tourna-ments and practices, and make sure she eats well while they’re on the road and often pay the tab.

“It goes to show what other people will do to help someone out who’s will-ing to put the time into themselves,” Walker underlines, noting Ntambwe is appreciative of the help she’s received, is a joy to coach, and fully deserves all accolades she achieves. “Because she works so hard, she puts so much effort in and she’s such a nice person, there’s lots of people that have stepped up to help her make it through financially.”

Walker donated his coaching hon-orarium to help cover Ntambwe’s fees, and provided free summertime beach volleyball training with his SportsCan program.

“He’s always been there,” Ntambwe says of her club coach since the 15U level. “He always pushed me to work hard. He always believed in me, and he knew I could do great things.”

CHAMPIONSHIPS ON TAP

The next stop on Ntambwe’s jour-ney will be her final youth provincial and national championships, coming up in April and May. The 18-and-under Mav-erick Broncos are hoping to replicate the run they went on at last year’s na-tionals. Ranked just 5th in Ontario, the Mavs came out 4th in Canada.

“Being in top-8 is the goal, then it’s any given Sunday,” Walker smiles. “That’s what happened to us last year. We just found a way to make it work on the important days.”

The Mavs are also hoping to get a boost from their upcoming trip to France during March break, where they’ll train at the French national team’s home base and play matches against local clubs.

Ntambwe won’t be part of the trip, instead staying home to work and save money for university.

Not many of her teammates or op-ponents face the same extent of finan-cial challenges she does, but Ntambwe doesn’t show a hint of bitterness.

“It doesn’t make me angry, but it certainly motivates me every single day,” she explains. “It pushes me to work harder and to see things from a different perspective, and appreciate things more.

“We’re all different. Everyone has their own barriers or challenges. But at the end of the day, being able to achieve my goals is a great feeling.”

NTAMBWE: Scraped together funds to the tune of $20,000+ for volleyball pursuits

A pair of local fighters squared off on Feb. 21

at Casino Lac Leamy during a card organized by Eye of the

Tiger Manage-ment featuring both Canadian and interna-

tional boxers.

Louisbert Altidor, who grew up in

Ottawa before moving to Montreal’s

boxing hotbed, won the bout on points over Ottawa’s Roody

René (left).

Clocking at the Casino

photo: dan plouffe

photo: steve kingsman

continued from p.1

5

2015 MAJOR AWARD WINNERS

Dustin Cook Male Athlete of the Year

Alpine Skiing

Agnes Laing Mayor’s Cup (Outstanding

Contribution to Local Sport)

FOR A FULL LIST OF WINNERS, VISIT WWW.OTTAWASPORTSAWARDS.CA

Melissa Bishop Female Athlete

of the Year, Athletics

Carleton Ravens Male Team of the Year

Basketball

Team Homan Female Team of the Year

Curling

Glenroy Gilbert Male Coach of the Year

Athletics

Jennifer Boyd Female Coach of the Year

Athletics

Ausome Ottawa Ottawa Sports Awards

Endowment Recipient

Sheilagh McCaskill Lifetime Achievement

Award – Volunteer/Admin

Tobie Gorman Lifetime Achievement

Award – Coach

Karen Butcher Lifetime Achievement

Award – Technical Official

Gord Stringer & Kathleen Stringer Spirit of Sport Award

Alex Bergstrom Howard Darwin Memorial

Scholarship Recipient

Irene Patrinos Howard Darwin Memorial

Scholarship Recipient

Dustin Cook and Melissa Bishop are both speedsters – the first on skis, the second on shoes – and they both cel-ebrated sweet silver medals at World Championships in 2015.

The local world-class athletes were born just six months apart and had their breakthrough successes at the same six-month gap – Cook at February’s FIS World Alpine Ski Championships in Colorado and Bishop at August’s IAAF World Athletics Champion-ships in Beijing.

And on Jan. 27 at Algon-quin College, Cook and Bishop gained one more thing in common when they won the city’s 2015 Male and Female Athlete of the Year honours at the Ottawa Sports Awards banquet.

“It’s a real honour for sure and it’s really nice to be recog-nized among these athletes,” says Cook, who also won su-per-g gold and bronze medals on the World Cup circuit in 2015 but is now sidelined with

a knee injury. “It was an amaz-ing year. Sometimes I still have to pinch myself to make sure it still happened.”

BISHOP BLASTS INTO WORLD’S BEST

Early in 2015, Bishop would have been shocked to be receiving awards of any kind come year end. The Ott-awa Lions Track-and-Field Club athlete was injured then, but came back stronger than ever.

Bishop won the women’s 800 metres at the Toronto

2015 Pan Am Games with an unforgettable finish, darting past a podium’s worth of rivals down the home stretch.

“I wish that everybody could run at home and be able to perform at home with the ho-metown crowd. It’s just some-thing so spectacular to have all those people screaming for you,” reflects the 27-year-old Eganville native who went on to win world silver and set a new Canadian record of 1:57.52. “It was a really special mo-ment, really cool.”

Taking home the Male and Female Team of the Year prizes at the Ottawa Sports Awards were the Carleton Ravens men’s basketball team and the Rachel Homan Ott-awa Curling Club rink. Ottawa Lions and Canadian 4x100 m relay team coach Glenroy Gil-bert and University of Ottawa Gee-Gees women’s rugby boss Jen Boyd were the Male and Female Coach of the Year.

See SportsOttawa.com for a more a detailed version of this story, as well as an in-depth Q & A interview with Melissa Bishop.

Silver skier & runner take top athlete prizes– COMMUNITY SPORTS –

photo: dan plouffe

By Dan Plouffe Dustin Cook.

6

Anyone s e r i o u s a b o u t h o c k e y should be p l a y i n g lacrosse.

From Gretzky to

Tavares, Shanahan to Stamkos, Canadian-born NHLers recom-mend playing lacrosse in the summer to improve hockey skills.

Both hockey and lacrosse are high tempo, physical team sports that have similar elements to the game. Both sports utilize 5 play-ers and a goalie, 3 periods and a strategy of developing odd-man situations to create scoring op-portunities. Hockey players ex-cel in lacrosse, and, in turn, they become markedly better hockey players.

Comparatively, lacrosse is a much less expensive sport than hockey and uses much of the same protective upper body equipment.

Hockey players benefit from lacrosse by developing:- Stick handling creativity- Creativity in tight areas- Reading the play offensively- Strong, dynamic defence tactics- Strength and endurance- Improved hand-eye coordination- Heads-up play- Leadership skills- Use of both hands- Speed & agility around net

- Quick transitions from defence to offence- Picking corners & shooting at small targets hones scoring skills- Ingenuity of fakes, back passes and shots- Self-esteem, respect, integrity and fairness- Appreciation for a new, fast-paced sport

THE UNDENIABLE LINKNot only did the “Great One”

play lacrosse in hockey’s off-season, but there is also a long list of NHL players who polished their skills by playing lacrosse in the summer.

IN THEIR WORDS:“I could hardly wait to get my

lacrosse stick out and start throw-ing the ball against the walls and working on our moves as we played the lacrosse equivalent to road hockey. All the good hockey players seemed to play lacrosse in those days and everyone of them learned something from the game to carry over to the other - things athletes can only learn by mixing up the games they play when they are young.”

– Wayne Gretzky

“It’s lacrosse that helped teach me to spin off checks, take shots and protect the puck under pres-sure. My stick skills, the way to read the play quickly comes from lacrosse. The hand-eye coordina-tion, is just one of the little things that helps you in hockey.”

– John Tavares

One last reason to play lacrosse – it’s FUN!

gloucester-lacrosse.com

FAMOUS HOCKEY PLAYERS WHO

BENEFITED FROM PLAYING LACROSSEWayne Gretzky, Bobby Orr,Gordie Howe, Sam Gagne,

Mike Gartner, Doug Gilmour, Paul Kariya, John MacLean,

Steve Larmer, Joe Nieuwendyk, Jonathan Toews, John Tavares,

Steven Stamkos, Dave Andreychuk, Paul Coffey,

Adam Oates, Brian Bellows, Mike Ridley, Gary Roberts, Cliff Ronning, Joe Sakic,

Brendan Shanahan, Kyle Turris, Sean Monahan, Cody Ceci, and the list keeps going...

PLAY LACROSSE!Gloucester

Lacrosse RegistrationTues. March 15 7-9pm St. Laurent Complex

Last chance early-bird fee!Online Registration

Ongoing.

Gloucester Griffins Jr. B Lacrosse ClubSkills Development

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Osgoode Arena April 9Brewer Arena April 17

A former Gloucester Griffin, Ottawa Senator Cody Ceci is just one current NHLer who played lacrosse growing up.

photo: steve

kingsman

@griffinslax

Why Hockey Players Should Play Lacrosse

– UNIVERSITIES –

It wasn’t the ending they were hoping for, but the Uni-versity of Ottawa Gee-Gees wo-men’s hockey team made their point: they are a contender again.

It had been 10 years since the 2004 Canadian Interuni-versity Sport national silver medallists posted a winning record, but this year the team earned an 11-6-3 mark in the extremely competitive Quebec conference.

The Gee-Gees finished the regular season ranked 9th in the country, and earned pairs of victories over both the once- invincible Montréal Carabins and McGill Martlets, who were ranked #2 and #3 nationally.

McGill got the best of uOt-tawa in the first round of the playoffs, however, in a 4-2

match and a 4-3 double-over-time thriller to end the Gee-Gees’ season.

“Everybody chipped in and we are very satisfied with what the players accomplished this season,” says Gee-Gees head coach Yanick Evola, who felt the playoff series could have easily gone either way. “Of course it is disappointing. We were hoping to go to Calgary to the CIS Championships. But we’ll just start to get ready for next year.”

Evola took over the Gee-Gees in 2010 and has at last started to see his program blossom.

“It’s a long process. You’re not building a championship program in a couple weeks. It takes years,” underlines the Quebec conference coach of the year. “The different philo-sophy that I brought, knowing that we needed to recruit some quality players to be able to ac-complish our team goals, we feel that right now that we have a great, great group of leaders to go with a great group of players that are always putting 100% into everything we do, and that showed throughout this year.”

ROOKIE RECRUIT RISES

Recruiting has been a fo-cal point for Evola, a Montreal native who’s brought in a ton of players from his home province to study at bilingual uOttawa. His biggest catch yet is probably Mélodie Bouchard from Sept-Îles. The Quebec conference rookie of the year finished 4th overall in scoring nationally this season (her 32 points in 19 games putting her 9 and 3 points behind Calgary players in 1st and 2nd who played 9 more games).

“Honestly, I believe that it’s

a team effort,” Bouchard ex-plains. “I wouldn’t have this hon-our without my teammates. It’s important to give credit to the girls because they make me better and they always push me to be the best I can be.”

Bouchard, who scored 2 goals and an assist in the play-offs, says the exit was tough, but that she is looking towards next season.

“I think after the year and playoffs we had, we have to be proud of ourselves,” signals the first-year education student. “I think the team we played against knew it wasn’t going to be easy to play us. We believe that we have made our place in this league and that we can compete with every team.”

Being successful in such a strong conference, with the powerhouse Carabins and Martlets at the top, makes the Gee-Gees’ success stand out that much more, Evola echoes.

“Ten out of 20 games, you’re playing against two great teams that are top-3 in the country,” underlines Evola, noting that Concordia and Car-leton aren’t slouches either. “You need some great players if you want compete against the great teams we’re playing every game. It’s really excit-ing to know that most of our players are coming back next year.”

The Gee-Gees will say good-bye to three veterans, while they anticipate six new players will jump in next season.

“We built a strong base,” Evola adds. “The players know now that it’s possible to be a national championship con-tender and they know what to do to accomplish that one day.”

Swagger returns to GGs women’s hockey programBy Josh Bell

photo: dan plouffe

Mélodie Bouchard finished 4th in CIS scoring in her rookie year

with the uOttawa Gee-Gees.

OLYMPIC HOPEFUL DOMINATES CIS SWIMMINGOttawa native Erika Seltenreich-Hodgson, a third-year Uni-

versity of British Columbia Thunderbird, was the most-decor-ated athlete at the Feb. 26-28 Canadian Interuniversity Sport Swimming Championships in Quebec City, winning five gold medals and two silver while setting a CIS championship record to win the women’s 200-metre individual medley 2 minutes, 12.85 seconds. The Rio 2016 hopeful will compete in the Canadian Olympic team trials April 5-10 in Toronto.

Ottawa native Eli Wall helped his University of Toronto Varsity Blues men’s team to the national title with a silver medal and three gold, including a CIS record of 1:02.43 in the 100 breast.

Led by Robert Bonomo’s bronze medals in the 50 and 100 m free, the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees men recorded a top-10 finish in the men’s standings, while the Gee-Gees women were 13th. For the first time in 12 years, a Carleton Ravens swimmer reached the CIS Swimming Championships. Rookie Thomas Leung’s top result was 22nd in the 50 m free.

RAVENS HOCKEY MEN DO-OR-DIE FOR NATIONALSThe Carleton Ravens men’s hockey team was swept out of

the Ontario University Athletics semi-finals by the University du Québec à Trois-Rivières Patriotes, but will still have a chance to earn a trip to the national championships when they host the OUA third-place match on Saturday, March 12.

Carleton previously swept Nipissing and upset McGill in the playoffs after a 20-7-1 regular season.

3 LOCAL TEAMS SHOOT FOR HOOPS NATIONALS

Three out of the four local university basketball teams will play for their shot at the CIS nationals on the March 12 week-end. The uOttawa women will host the OUA Final Four thanks to their 17-2 regular season title and a 55-43 playoff win over Guelph. The Gee-Gees will face McMaster in the March 11 semi-final, while Windsor and McMaster will battle in the other semi with the finalists advancing to nationals.

The Gee-Gees men escaped with a 73-72 home-court win over Queen’s and the host Ravens men blasted Brock 90-52 to setup a semi-final showdown between last year’s national fi-nalists on March 11 at Ryerson University. The winner will earn a guaranteed CIS Championships berth while the other will be the leading candidate for the nationwide at-large berth thanks to their #1 (Carleton) and #2 (Ottawa) national rankings.

RAVENS ROOKIE PUTS ALPINE SKI ON THE MAP Carleton Ravens alpine skier Hannah Schmidt has recorded

a number of podium finishes this season on the Quebec univer-sity circuit. The West Carleton Secondary School grad earned 2nd-place finishes at St-Sauveur on Feb. 13 and 14 and won on Feb. 20 at Le Relais, with Ottawa native Stephanie Gould of Laval placing 3rd. See SportsOttawa.com for more university news.

7

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– COMMUNITY SPORTS –

They are champions and volunteers, coaches and pioneers, and field hockey runs through their veins.

Parents Sandeep and Maureen Chopra, and their three children – Halley, Rohan and Marek – are the driving force behind what has become one of Ottawa’s fastest-growing amateur sports programs.

“We’ve gone from 300 to 600 hours of field time this year alone,” highlights Sandeep, the family patriarch and founder of the Nepean Nighthawks Field Hockey Club.

Created seven years ago after Maureen launched a successful initiative to get women and their young children involved in sport, the Nepean club now boasts a number of current and past players representing Canada on the international stage – including the two youngest Chopra children, Rohan and Marek.

“Our program for the boys is producing a disproportionate number of kids who are playing on the national team,” smiles Sandeep, noting Nighthawks Braedon Muldoon and Liam Man-ning pushed Canada to its best-ever result in a major international field hockey competition when they won a silver medal at the 2014 Youth Olympic Games in China.

Eighteen-year-old Rohan narrowly missed out on making the five-a-side Youth Olympics team, but is now part of Canada’s under-21 junior de-velopment program, centralized in Vancouver.

The first-year Langara College student will

compete at this summer’s Junior Pan American Championships in Toronto, where a top-2 finish will secure a place at December’s Men’s Junior World Cup in India.

Marek, 17, will also represent Canada in Toronto for a series of under-18 games against the U.S. this month. The John McCrae Second-ary School student was a 2014 national cham-pion as a member of U-16 Team Ontario.

It’s not only the five aforementioned Chop-ras who have built field hockey locally. It was Sandeep’s father who planted the early seeds in the 1970s, while brother Anil and his daughters also play a big part in driving the sport forward.

While it’s clear that field hockey greatness runs in the family, it appears modesty and chiv-alry are not too far behind.

Both Sandeep and Maureen are quick to point out the accomplishments of others, but

they’re hesitant to discuss the success of their own children, and only reluctantly take any credit for their accomplishments.

“The fact that our three kids play is a joy to us,” states Sandeep.

“We’re so proud of them,” adds Maureen, herself a former national team member and bronze medallist at the 1995 Pan Am Games in Argentina. “But we’re proud of all our players just the same.”

On top of the Chopras, there’s a veritable army of parents and volunteers who are quick to help out with the new sport their children have fallen in love with.

“There’s just such a strong sense of com-munity here,” says Angela Davidson, whose children play for the Nighthawks and are also referees.

The Chopras’ eldest child, Halley, is following

the family pioneering spirit. The third-year civil engineering student recently restarted a school field hockey program at Carleton University.

TAKING AFTER MOM & DAD

Carleton had been without field hockey since its Canadian Interuniversity Sport team was cut following the 2010 season, until Halley helped revive it this past fall.

“We had 70 people sign up at the beginning of the year,” smiles Halley, hardly able to con-tain her excitement. “I mean, it’s not too hard to start a club at Carleton, but to have it take off is a challenge.”

Of the 70 who initially joined, between 35 and 40 continued playing throughout the fall semester. Unfortunately, Halley reflects, the ab-sence of financial support from the university makes it difficult to offer a year-round schedule.

“The cost of renting the fieldhouse for an hour and a half is close to $450,” highlights the 20-year-old. “So we didn’t have enough money to keep going through the second semester.”

Despite the hardships, Halley is convinced the club will continue to grow, and is encour-aged by the sentiments of surprise expressed by student leaders and school officials at how fast the program has grown. She’d like field hockey to become a full-fledged varsity team within the next 3-5 years. Varsity or not, there’s one constant – no love for the Gee-Gees.

“We played a game against the University of Ottawa this year,” Halley chuckles, “and we beat them really bad – so that was fun!”

The Chopras: Ottawa’s far-reaching first family of field hockeyBy Brian Hill (From left) Maureen, Halley, Marek &

Sandeep (plus Vancouver-based Rohan) make up the Chopra family roster.

photo: steve kingsman

8

They’ve won titles, dazzled recruiters, earned scholarships in Canada and USA, and now the OSU Force Academy 1998-born Girls have reinvented an old saying: when it comes to them, great things come in threes.

A trio of graduating OSU products have signed to play NCAA soccer at the University of Maine, while three more are headed to Algonquin College.

Kaitlyn Ball, Nicole Bailey and Priscilla Domingo will become Maine Black Bears, while Andrianna Dmuchalsky, Hailey Martin and Georgia Iliopoulos will continue developing at Algonquin under their current OSU coach, Dom Oliveri, and four more players from their illustrious squad are set to play university soccer elsewhere as well.

“We’re exceptionally pleased to have all theses players moving on to the next level, and it’s particularly special that many of them will be doing it together,” highlights OSU General Manager Jim Lianos. “That speaks volumes about the soccer skills they’ve developed at OSU, but also about the strong connections and relationships they’ve made with one another. We are certainly very proud.”

Also headed off to play NCAA soccer with the University of Min-nesota is goalkeeper Taylor Beltz, while 1999-born Gillian Campbell is graduating high school a year early and headed to Mount Allison to study psychology.

“I am grateful to OSU for providing me with the opportunity to de-velop as a soccer player, as a teammate, and as a leader,” states Camp-bell, also thanking coaches and everyone who contributed to her de-velopment. “I have learned so much from practice, league play, camps, tournaments and showcases and hope to make an impact this fall.“

Rounding out the list of OSU commitments are University of New Brunswick-bound Erin Foley and Clarisse Ramirez to bring the total number of signees to 10, with half a year to go still until the start of the fall scholastic soccer season.

“Since a very young age, our club staff and coaches knew that the 1998 girls were an extremely talented group of young athletes,” Lianos underlines, saluting their dedication to the sport. “They’ll most defin-itely always hold a special place for us at OSU. After all, they were our first provincial-level champions, and look what they started.”

OTTAWA’S 1ST PROVINCIAL-LEVEL YOUTH CHAMPSThe Force 1998 girls won the U14 Ontario Youth Soccer League East

Division crown in 2012 – the first team from Eastern Ontario to ever ac-complish that feat. That icebreaker opened the floodgates for a number of OSU sides to go on and win east division, provincial league, Ontario and Quebec-Ontario Cup titles in subsequent years.

Also on that first champion team were Anna Munro, currently with the Duke University Blue Devils, and Alexis Martel-Lamothe, who recently debuted with the national women’s under-20 team at age 17 and helped Canada qualify for November’s FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup.

“To see these players rewarded for their hard work and dedication over the past number of years is very pleasing,” notes OSU Club Tech-nical Director Paul Harris. “Having had the chance to see these players develop within our system and commit to excellence both on the field and in the classroom is something we hope will inspire our younger players to reach similar heights.

“We wish all of our graduating players the best of success in their next endeavours.”

OSU ’98 girls head to university en masseOSU Force Academy Zone

www.osu.ca

Graduating OSU Force teammates Nicole Bailey, Priscilla Domingo and Kaitlyn Ball will continue to play with one another

next fall with the NCAA’s University of Maine Black Bears.

– COMMUNITY SPORTS –

The nation’s capital hosted a pile of high-profile cross-country ski events in the past month. ShovelFest 2016 wasn’t one of those.

But the gathering of a group of 50+ volunteers to prepare a relatively barren Nakkertok Nordic Ski Club course in time for the early-February Eastern Canadian Cross-Country Ski Championships is the type of behind-the-scenes effort that a pas-sionate local nordic community routinely contributes to bring the big shows to life.

“We had very little snow through the early part of the season, and quite a bit of warm weather, which didn’t help,” re-counts Dirk Van Wijk, the owner of the Nakkertok land in Cantley along with wife Claudia. “But there’s such a spirit with all these people. The minute you say we need help at Nakkertok shovelling snow, you get 50 people with their shovels.

“It’s incredible what that many people with shovels can put onto a race course. We covered a race course in a half a day with 20 cm of snow. That made all the difference this year.”

SKI TOUR HITS JACQUES-CARTIER

February’s wacky weather offered the opposite challenge at the first stage of the Ski Tour Canada FIS World Cup races.

The snow from the Winterlude Snow-flake Kingdom was already “tricky to deal with” since it comes in big heaps and in-cludes artificial snow, and that was before the region got a massive dump followed by a lot of rain to make it even harder to push around, but “120 hours later, we’ve got a ski course from a sliding centre” at a “beautiful location” looking over the Ottawa River towards the Parliament Buildings, notes Van Wijk, the course preparation chief.

“When this concept first got pro-posed, a lot of people thought, ‘Oh my God, why are we doing this? It’s going to be so much work and effort,’” recalls Van Wijk, who also helped prepare the course on Montreal’s Mont Royal before the Tour

went to Quebec City and Canmore, Alta. “But to have the best in the world come ski eight races in Canada, like it’s never going to happen in our lifetime again. It’s such a cool thing.”

Nakkertok-brewed siblings Katherine and Patrick Stewart-Jones of Chelsea qualified to compete alongside the world’s top athletes at the World Cup, finishing 68th and 84th respectively in the women’s and men’s sprint free events.

A slew of international skiers also vis-ited the region for the Feb. 26-28 Gatineau Loppet, federal politicians joined athletes and young local students for a Feb. 24 ski on the Parliament Hill lawn, while Nakker-tok also hosted the Feb. 19-21 Ontario University Athletics Championships.

“Nakkertok’s been a busy place this winter,” underlines Van Wijk, a Glebe resident whose family also operates Madawaska Kanu Centre in the summer, also highlighting the fact that local skiers produced a pile of exceptional results at the events. “Nakkertok, and the whole area, has a lot of very strong skiers.”

RAVENS END RIVALS’ DYNASTY

At the OUAs, the Carleton Ravens wo-men’s nordic ski team ended an 11-year Lakehead reign when they won the Ontario team title at home, while the Ravens men finished 2nd behind Lakehead.

Carleton’s Nicholas Clifford was named coach of the year.

The Ravens excelled with a deep team of tightly-packed finishers through the three days of racing, claiming the most OUA all-star selections – and nearly half of all the 20 available positions – with Megan Evans, Emilie Stewart-Jones, Emily Jones, Alex-andra Slobodian, Alyssa Stowe, Carring-ton Pomeroy, Patrick van Walraven, Chris Weller and Avery Vreugdenhil-Beauclerc.

EASTERNS EXCELLENCE

More than 700 skiers compete at the Feb. 5-7 Eastern Canadian Champion-ships, which couldn’t have come together without the active families that step for-ward to volunteer and drive the event, Van

Wijk emphasizes.“Easterns has now become a com-

munity-run event,” he notes, explaining that all the local clubs work together as a group to act as co-hosts. “It’s a tight com-munity of very, very like-minded people.”

COOPERATIVE CLUBS KEY

It’s a spirit amongst that tends to run across the Canadian cross-country scene.

“I really like seeing everyone from across the country who comes to these races because I’ve made friends with them,” indicates Nakkertok’s Ali Pouw, who won women’s junior A 10 km free bronze and junior 10 km classic mass start silver medals at Easterns.

“I wanted to finish the weekend off with a bang,” adds the University of British Columbia-bound Glebe Collegiate Institute student who received a running scholar-ship. “We ski the 5k course multiple times, so I know it like the back of my hand.”

With boys’ juvenile 2000-born 7.5 km free gold and juvenile 10 km mass start bronze, Andrew Hayman another big win-ner amongst a large contingent of Nakker-tok medallists.

“Nakkertok is a great team of people, staff, wax technicians to prepare the skis – it’s really good,” signals the Grade 10 West Carleton Secondary School student whose Nakkertok teammate Ben Milley finished right on his heels in the 10 km race. “I love training with people who definitely push you. Having a lot of really strong team-mates is definitely a big plus for the club.”

Also winning medals for Nakkertok at Easterns were Britt Halvorsen (girls’ midget 2003 5 km free bronze), Tove Halvorsen (girls’ jr. B 1999 3 km free bronze), Pierre Grall-Johnson (boys’ jr. B 1999 3 km free bronze), Zoë Williams (girls’ jr. A 1.4 km free bronze), Benjamin Croteau (boys’ mid-get 2002 3 km free gold), Mallory Willi-ams (girls’ midget 2003 3 km free gold), and Katherine Stewart-Jones (women’s 15 km mass start bronze), while Lisgar Collegiate Institute student Alia Sanger of Chelsea Nordic won gold medals in the girls’ jr. B 1999 5 km free and 3 km free.

Ski community rallies strong spirit for major events

By Dan Plouffe

Winterlude’s Snowflake Kingdom became Alex Harvey’s Kingdom for the FIS World Cup tour stop at Jacques-Cartier Park.

photo: steve kingsman

9

LOCAL DIVERS SPRING TO THE PODIUM AT SPRING PROVINCIALSHenry McKay of the Nepean-Ottawa Diving Club swept all three of his events in the Group A (age 16-18) to lead a big medal haul for local athletes at the March 3-6 Dive Ontario Spring Provincials in Toronto. Also champion in the 1-metre springboard and platform events, McKay’s most impressive victory came on the 3 m springboard, where he dusted all competitors by over 100 points with his total score of 508.15. In women’s Group C (age 12-13) competition, Kathryn Grant won gold on 1 m and Emma Corrigan earned silver on 3 m (missing the #1 spot by just 1.35 points), and then the Ottawa National Diving Club teammates stood on the podium together for platform (Grant with gold and Corrigan with bronze). ONDC men’s Group C competitor Timothy Lewis won silver in all three of his events, as did NODC’s Owen Pickering in men’s Group D, while NODC’s Victor Hearn got triple-bronze in men’s Group C. ONDC’s Catherine Boyer and NODC’s Kate Miller swapped places on the podium in women’s Group D (age 10-11) 1 m and 3 m, with Boyer taking gold and Miller bronze on 1 m before the switch on 3 m. They then finished 1-2 on platform, with Miller taking gold.

RA Centre badminton players Andrew D’Souza and Alex Bruce combined to win three medals at the Feb. 3-6 Yonex Senior Canadian Badminton Championships in Winnipeg. Bruce won three matches with mixed doubles partner Toby Ng to reach the final, where she met up with her women’s doubles partner Phyllis Chan and Philippe Charron. Bruce and Ng, the Toronto 2015 Pan Am Games silver medallists, prevailed 21-16, 21-23, 21-18 to win gold. In the women’s doubles event, all three of Bruce and Chan’s matches went three sets en route to silver behind Michelle Li and Rachel Honderich. D’Souza earned silver in the men’s singles event. The Pan Am Games silver medallist won four consecutive matches in straight sets to reach the final before falling 12-21, 18-21 to Markham’s Jason Ho-Shue.

3 NATIONAL MEDALS FOR RA CENTRE BADMINTON STARS

Ottawa bobsled rookie Kasha Lee capped her first season racing for Canada with a 5th-place finish in the team event at the Feb. 8-21 World Championship in Austria. While only an exhibition race, the 23-year-old brakeman nonetheless also took the gold medal position in the first-ever four-woman competition staged at the worlds, besting three other sleds with Kaillie Humphries as her pilot. Look for more later this month on SportsOttawa.com.

ROOKIE BOBSLEDDER WINS FOUR-WOMEN EXHIBITION RACE AT WORLDS

PENTATHLETE BLASTS OFF IN NEW SEASON, ON TRACK FOR RIO

JR. SENS REPEAT, GRADS SURPRISE IN CCHL REGULAR SEASON

OTTAWA SPORTSPAGE SNAPSHOTS

After missing a chance to qualify at last summer’s Pan Am Games on Canadian soil, modern pentathlete Melanie McCann vowed she’d make it to the Olympics one way or another, and took a perfect first step in that quest to begin her 2016 season. Competing at the Open Spanish International event on Feb. 6, the 26-year-old Ottawa-based athlete was fourth to leave the line for the handicapped start to the combined event (based on points accumulated in the first three events), but battled to the front and overtook the leader with 50 metres left in the run. While not as deep a field as a World Cup event, McCann did beat a handful of top-30 world-ranked athletes, including #7 Margaux Isaksen of USA. McCann picked up 40 points for the win and then added another 42 with her 7th-place finish at the season’s first World Cup Feb. 24-28 in Cairo in the quest for an

Olympic qualification position, which she can safely attain by maintaining her current world ranking position at #12. Eight positions are granted to the highest world-ranked athletes not already qualified by other means and McCann is currently 4th out of that bunch.

A big crew of local athletes represented Team Ontario at the Canadian Age Class Long Track Championships, and several hit the podium at the Feb. 6-7 event in Quebec City. Ottawa Pacers athletes collectively earned a medal of each colour – gold for Connor Rogerson (15-year-old boys’ 3000 m), silver for Cole Rogerson (14-year-old boys’ 100 m) and bronze for Robert Gaudreault (15-year-old boys’ 300 m), while Edouard Parent of the Gloucester Concordes won a full set of medals on his own (gold in 500 m, 300 m silver and 100 m bronze) en route to a 3rd-place finish overall for 12-year-old boys, and fellow Concorde Antoine Parent grabbed a bronze in the 15-year-old boys’ 3,000 m. At the Feb. 5-7 Canadian Junior Long Track Championships in Winnipeg, Jake Weidemann finished 6th overall.

LOCAL LONG-TRACKERS EARN NATIONAL MEDALS

The 40-14-8 Ottawa Jr. Senators won their fourth-consecutive Yzerman Division regular season title, but it was the Cumberland Grads’ 2nd-place finish that raised the most eyebrows this season in the Central Canada Jr. ‘A’ Hockey League. From a 15-43-4 season and just one spot away from the league basement last season, the Grads rocketed up the ranks to finish 36-19-7 this year. Cumberland native Matthieu Fran-che says consistency in the coaching ranks and the winning attitude Sylvain Favreau instilled in the club this season is the #1 reason for the turnaround. “I believe 99% of the success we’ve had this season is thanks to him,” indicates the 16-year-old defenceman. “He really changed the team’s men-

tality.” Look for updates on the CCHL playoffs this month on SportsOttawa.com.

5 OTTAWA SOCCER PLAYERS ENTER NATIONAL TEAM STREAMFive local soccer players took part in a Canada Soccer national Excel program camp from Feb. 28-March 3 in Vaughan: West Ottawa’s Idir Zerrouk and Ottawa South United players Nana Nuama Nuama-Mensah, Antonio Carlini, Mehdi Essoussi and Daniel Assaf. Alongside gatherings in B.C. and Montreal, the Vaughan camp was one of three that brought together 60 athletes from the under-15 men’s level to

identify talent for future involvement in Canadian national team programs.

Nepean-Kanata Barracudas swimmer Mia Zahab won five medals as her club hosted the March 3-6 Ontario Long-Course Spring Provincial Swimming Championships at the Nepean Sportsplex. Also winning youth-level provincial titles were NKB’s Raeleigh Mooij (girls’ 15-year-olds 50 m free), Dylan Byers of the Greater-Ottawa Kingfish (boys’ 15 200 free), Ravens of Carleton’s Jo Storm (girls’ 13-and-under 400 IM), NKB’s Katie Breault (girls’ 16-17 400 IM), and NKB relay teams featuring Breault in the 200 medley and Mackenzie Houston in the 200 free, and Chuchu Yang, Victoria McKendry and Jessica Yu in both. GO Kingfish’s Keaton Zhou set 10-and-under boys’

club records in winning the 50 and 100 breast races at the Feb. 20-21 Ontario Winter Short Course Festival in Markham. NKB’s David Quirie won both the 200 free and 200 back at the same event.

LOCAL SWIMMERS SHINE IN PROVINCIAL MEETS

ST. PETER CHS RUGBY COACH PICKED TO LEAD RAVENSThe Carleton Ravens elevated assistant coach Pat Thompson into the head coach position for their women’s rugby team, the school announced in early March. “It is a really great opportunity to work in a high-perform-ance environment where the coaches get to see the players on a day-to-day basis,” Thompson, a long-time local high school coach, said in a Ravens media release. “I really want to create a culture of excellence where we are pushing our players to be the best student-athletes they can be.” The appointment puts Thompson back on a crosstown collision course with Jen Boyd, now the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees coach. For years, Boyd’s Ashbury Colts were a thorn in the side of Thompson’s St. Peter Knights until the Knights finally broke

through in recent years and earned a provincial silver medal last season – a trend he’ll now hope to replicate with the Ravens.

OTTAWA, NEPEAN IN TOUGH FOR PWHL PLAYOFFSCaptain Tasza Tarnowski scored her second goal of the game to lift her #15-seeded Ottawa Lady Sens to a 4-3 up-set victory over #2-ranked Whitby in their second home game of the Provincial Women’s Hockey League playoffs, evening their series at 1-1. On the heels of a 20-8-10 regular season, the #8 Nepean Wildcats will need to reel off a trio of victories on home ice March 11-13 to avoid elimination at the hands

of Waterloo following overtime and shootout defeats to open their first-round series.

Ottawa Akademy snowboarder John Leslie placed 2nd and 4th at February parasnowboard World Cup events in Colorado and B.C.

PARASNOWBOARD LANDS ON PODIUM, JUST MISSES AT WORLD CUPS

Carp native Joanna Brown got her 2016 season off to a solid start by placing 4th at the March 5 Clermont Challenge Pan American Cup race in Florida. The Guelph-based 23-year-old Bytown Storm-brewed triathlete was the top Canadian at the event. Cur-rent Storm triathlete Meagan Adams was also the top Canadian (and fastest finisher under age 20) in the U25 elite development race at the same event.

STRONG SEASON STARTS FOR LOCAL TRIATHLETES

OTTAWA SOCCER PLAYER COMPETING FOR COSTA RICAWith a 4-2 loss to Mexico on March 4 and a 3-2 win over Jamaica on March 6, 14-year-old Ottawa soccer player Carmin Marin’s Costa Rican under-17 women’s soc-cer team maintained a faint hope of advancing to the knockout stage at the CONCACAF U-17 Women’s Championship in Grenada, with a final group match against USA loom-ing. Marin, whose father grew up in Costa Rica and has many extended family mem-bers still residing there, was substituted in during both of her team’s first 2 matches.

OTTAWA RESIDENT GETS CANADIAN TIRE BACKYARD RINK PRIZEOttawa’s Jeff Murray was named Canadian Tire’s Great Ca-nadian Hoser for his backyard rink-making efforts. Murray’s rink is a hit in his community, and inspired several neigh-bours to build their own rinks in the east-side Lindenlea neighbourhood. His prize was the coveted gold-hose trophy, a $1,000 Canadian Tire gift card to purchase “hoses for

life”, an in-ice “We All Play For Canada” logo etched into the rink and a visit from Spartacat.

Ottawa lost two familiar faces from its amateur sports scene in the past month. Bill Foster coached men’s and women’s junior and senior teams with the Ottawa Irish Rugby Club, while Terry McKinty was a pioneer in the local triathlon and running community though his Somer-sault Events operation. Foster was 56 and McKinty was 69.

CAPITAL LOSES 2 LOCAL SPORTS SCENE STALWARTS

STITTSVILLE RUGBY PLAYER APPEARS FOR CANADAStittsville native Conor Keys was part of the Canadian men’s rugby under-20

national team for a World Rugby U20 Trophy qualification match on Feb. 13 in Austin, TX. The University of Victoria student and his mates lost a 19-18 battle to USA in the one-game deciding

match to determine who would participate in the global event.

2 WINS, 4 LOSSES FOR WHEELCHAIR RUGBY PLAYERPatrice Dagenais and the Canadian wheelchair rugby team beat Brazil twice (61-42 & 53-40) but lost a pair of contests to both Australia (60-52 & 66-57) and champion Great Britain (57-53 & 50-47) at the Feb. 26-28 Rio test event in Brazil.

Alaine Chartrand of the Nepean Skating Club placed 11th at the Feb. 16-21 ISU Four Continents event in Taiwan. The 19-year-old Canadian champion will compete next at the March 28-April 3 ISU World Figure Skating Championships in Boston.

CHARTRAND 11TH AT FOUR CONTINENTS

It’ll be the Calgary In-ferno squaring off against Les Canadiennes de Mon-tréal in the Canadian Wo-men’s Hockey League’s championship game on March 13 in Ottawa at the Canadian Tire Centre.

The Clarkson Cup is the Stanley Cup of wo-men’s hockey, although perhaps the Grey Cup is a closer cousin out of the trio of trophies donated by Governor Generals of Canada given its format – a one game, winner-take-all championship at a pre-de-termined site.

“It’s more of an event now,” indicates Cup organ-izing committee member Patrick Pion, the Ottawa Senators’ director of stra-tegic development, not-ing the Sunday afternoon game will be preceded on the Friday and Saturday by the league’s awards gala and community day.

The NHL club partnered with the CWHL to bring the Clarkson Cup to the nation’s capital for the first time this year and in 2017 to coincide with Canada’s 150th an-

niversary.“The tournament has

always been hosted in the Toronto area, or Markham, so they wanted to expand here,” Pion highlights. “Hopefully it gives them a bigger profile to have it in an NHL rink and in a city like Ottawa.”

While Ottawa hasn’t had a CWHL franchise since it folded in 2010, there is a handful of local content connected to the Cup.

Although their Bramp-ton Thunder were swept in their best-of-3 semi-fi-nal series against Calgary, CWHL players and Ottawa natives Erica Howe and Jamie Lee Rattray put to-gether an in-game promo-tion for a Sens home game.

Howe is up for goalie of the year at the awards ce-

remony along with Boston’s Geneviève Lacasse, who trains in Ottawa during her off-season.

And Ottawa-born Chel-sey Saunders will be part of the big game, fighting for a championship with Les Canadiennes, who are led by Canadian Olympic hero Marie-Philip Poulin. The 24-year-old defender is in her second season with the Montreal franchise and is looking forward to the opportunity to play back at home.

“It’s good for Ottawa and the community,” sig-nals Saunders, a former Nepean Jr. Wildcats player who won two Canadian uni-versity titles with the McGill Martlets. “I know there are a couple girls’ teams going. It’s exciting for them, and my friends and family.”

Clarkson Cup features Ottawa links– ELITE –

file photos

By Alex Quevillon Erica Howe (left) & Geneviève Lacasse.

10 EDITORIAL

Mailing address:345 Meadowbreeze Dr.

Kanata, Ont. K2M 0K3

The Ottawa Sportspage is a not-for-profit publication devoted to shining a spot-light on local amateur sport.

Under the direction of the Ottawa Community Sport Media Team, our group also promotes access-to-sports initiatives for local youth who live in social housing communities.

Contact:Editor: Dan Plouffe

613-261-5838Editor@SportsOttawa.com

OTTAWA COMMUNITY SPORT MEDIA TEAMBoard of Directors

Josh BellAnne DugganJohn Haime

Josh KaranjaDan Plouffe (Executive Director)

Mohamed SofaDoug Scorrar

In a time where newspapers are dying off, we here at the Ottawa Sportspage are very excited to be taking a great step forward in our evolution.

This edition marks the official start of the Sportspage being pub-lished under the banner of the Ott-awa Community Sport Media Team, a registered not-for-profit organ-ization devoted to celebrating the success of local community sport and promoting access-to-sport initi-atives.

The Sportspage looks a bit dif-ferent (better we hope?) to recog-nize this new era, but don’t worry, the type of news you read in our pages won’t change a whole lot. Given cutbacks in the industry, we remain doubly committed to shin-ing a light on local amateur sport – from high schools, universities and community clubs to elite amateur/Olympic sport.

So why the change? As a not-for-profit, we now match the bulk of volunteer-driven groups that drive Canadian sport, it helps facilitate partnerships with like-minded organ-izations, and most of all, it will fuel an expansion of our CAMPS Project.

The Connecting Athletes of All Means to Paths in Sport Project provides free sports opportunities

and transportation to youth living in Ottawa Community Housing neigh-bourhoods.

We work in collaboration with many of the sports groups you see advertised in this newspaper to provide free positions to youth who otherwise wouldn’t have the ability to take part in community sport and enjoy and of its positive benefits.

Currently, the CAMPS Project is centred primarily on summer sports camps, which provides the spark for these young athletes to take an in-terest in a new sport, or one they likely haven’t experienced within an organized setting.

We will now be working towards implementing a year-round program so participants can work with the experts in youth athlete develop-ment, and open the path to univer-sity or college athletics, or a career in sport.

Our cover story is on an athlete who’s overcome a number of barri-ers to excel in the volleyball world – Antoinette Ntambwe, who lives in one of the communities we work with at Britannia Woods.

To be clear, she is not one of the youth we’ve helped with the CAMPS Project – it’s the local volleyball com-munity that’s largely to thank for helping to support the Université de

Montréal-bound player on her jour-ney.

But Antoinette’s success is the kind of story we want to replicate, and hopefully make the road a bit smoother for others in her shoes.

Antoinette’s coach, Colin Walker, says their team’s always been very positive and willing to help her out when needed and that par-ents recognize that everybody isn’t as fortunate as their child may be.

“But, I’ve heard stories where it hasn’t been that way,” Colin em-phasizes. “There are many, many, many more people in her scenario that haven’t been given the same type of opportunities for sure.

“It just goes to show you that if you put the support in, you can get the results.”

Of course, not everyone has the talent to be a high-performance ath-lete. For us, a valued outcome for a CAMPS Project participant would be to inspire them to be active for live, and take an interest in becom-ing the next generation of sports leaders – to pay it forward – and act as role models in our community.

That’s what Antoinette has in mind. In her Maverick Volleyball Club profile, she says once she’s done university, she’d like to open a foundation to help financially-

challenged athletes. As one of eight children in her family, Antoinette un-derstands the need.

“A lot of us want to play sports,” she notes. “Being able to afford the whole season, it’s expensive – that’s something I know a lot of athletes can’t do. They can’t achieve their goals and they can’t play sports, even club or recreational, because of financial problems.

“As an athlete, I went through that, and I wouldn’t want other ath-letes with the potential to make it far and achieve their goals to miss that opportunity because of finan-cial issues.”

We encourage you to sup-port Antoinette as she pre-pares for varsity volleyball and studying at university. You can find her crowdfunding page at: gofundme.com/antoinettentambwe

Included as part of the Ottawa Community Sport Media Team’s March 31 launch event (advertised on the front page) will be a fundrais-ing campaign to help other athletes like Antoinette. Look for full details in our April edition.

If you’re part of a group that would like to be involved in the CAMPS Project, we’d love to hear from you. E-mail editor@sportsottawa.com

New look, new era for Ottawa Sportspage & CAMPS Project access-to-sport initiative

Team Members: Doug Kee, Jason Camm, Matthew Hall, Curtis Easter & Coach Ray Bushfield.

About: The Doug Kee-skipped Navan Curling Club rink went 5-5 to finish 7th at the Jan. 23-31 Ca-nadian Junior Curling Championships in Stratford. Lead Curtis Easter, second Matthew Hall and third Jason Camm all earned second-team all-star honours thanks to their percentages through-out the tournament. The Navan rink previously won all eight of their matches en route to the Ontario junior title.

Sport: Swimming

Club: Nepean-Kanata Barracudas

School/Grade: Grade 9 John McCrae SS

About: Nepean-Kanata Barracu-das swimmer Mia Zahab won the girls’ 14-year-olds 1,500-metre freestyle race by over 16 seconds as her club hosted the March 3-6 Ontario Long-Course Spring Provincial Swim-ming Championships at the Nepean Sportsplex. Zahab’s winning time of 18 minutes, 1.86 seconds qualified her for the summertime senior-level Canadian Swimming Championships at age 14. She also collected a medal of each colour from the 800 m free (gold), the 200 butterfly (silver) and a pair of bronze from the 200 & 400 individual medley. A month earlier, Zahab earned the individual high point award in her age group as her NKB club took the top team honours at the Eastern Ontario regionals.

YMCA-YMCA OF THE NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION

STARS OF THE MONTH Team of the

Month: Doug Kee

Navan Curling Club Rink

Athlete of the Month:

Mia Zahab

“Every little experience along the way played a big part and now I can say, this is my time,” she added. “I have worked hard to get here.”

While Wiebe was undoubtedly thrilled with her latest accomplish-ment, earning an Olympic berth was always part of the plan.

She is looking forward to fulfilling a childhood dream – one many athletes only dream of achieving – while keep-ing her focus on what lies ahead.

“I knew I was going to qualify,” Wiebe reflected. “Earning the right to compete is the first step. I am really excited for what’s to come.”

BRUISES & BRONZE

NCWC product Alex Brown-Theri-ault fell short of securing an Olympic berth in the men’s 85 kg greco-roman class, losing both of his matches at the Pan Am Olympic qualifier.

A week earlier at the Pan Am Championships (without Rio implica-tions), NCWC alum Ilya Abelev won a bronze medal in the men’s 74 kg freestyle event, recording dominant wins over Brazilian and Puerto Rican opponents and a loss to USA’s Jordan Burroughs.

WIEBE: ‘I knew I was

going to qualify’

continued from p.3

MOwed down

photo: steve kingsman

Ottawa native John Morris (left) and his Pat Simmons-skipped Team Canada rink got off to a hot start at the March 5-13 Tim Hortons Brier at TD Place, jumping to the top of the men’s national curling championship tournament standings with a 3-0 record after five draws.

Morris and his mates crushed Quebec 7-2, beat Saskatchewan 5-4, and topped Northwest Territories 6-3 to open defence of their Canadian title. Morris, the 2010 Olympic gold medallist who now lives just outside Calgary, curled 93%, 89% and 99% to lead the tournament’s thirds in percentage.

Meanwhile, Morris’ father Earle was set to be inducted into the Canadian Curling Hall of Fame on March 9 at the Westin Ottawa.

Earle served as coach for many rinks including John’s world junior-champion crew out of the Ottawa Curling Club, Rachel Homan’s national-champion and multi-world medallist team, and last/this year’s Simmons gang.

As a player, Earle was the first man to represent three different provinces at the Brier – a feat now matched by his son. The 70-year-old has also been involved in the development of numerous national curling program initiatives.

At the Feb. 20-28 Scotties Tournament of Hearts in Grande Prairie, Alta., Jenn Hanna’s Ottawa Curling Club rink was one win away from getting into the national wo-men’s championship’s playoff round. After a 1-3 start, Hanna bounced back to post a final record of 6-5.

11– HIGH SCHOOLS –

It didn’t matter whether it was charging down a hill or across flat land, national capital athletes dis-played lightning speed on skis at both the OFSAA high school provincial alpine and nordic championships at the tail end of February.

The local association’s skiers brought home numerous titles and piles of medals of various colours from the pair of OFSAA competitions held in the Collingwood area.

The Louis-Riel Rebelles boys’ team repeated as provincial champs in the Level 2 competition for ski league-affili-ated athletes, winning both the slalom and giant slalom events as Damon Kral, Justin Neron, Ben Beaudoin and slalom individual silver medallist Jona-thon Neron all scored top finishes.

“When you go to a team event like this, it is difficult to finish your races every time,” says Ken Levesque, who has coached the Louis-Riel team for eight years. “These boys were really consistent as a team.”

She and her defending Level 2 OFSAA-champion Louis-Riel girls’ teammates missed this year’s na-tional capital finals due to a conflicting club race, but Sierra Smith earned a much bigger opportunity instead.

The Grade 10 student in the school’s sports-études program earned the chance to compete at March’s Trofeo Topolino competition in Italy – one of the world’s premiere in-ternational youth races – thanks to her performance at the Feb. 18-21 Mid-winter Can-Am event in Collingwood.

After 6th-place and 3rd-place results in giant slalom races, Smith climbed up into the second available qualification position thanks to a pair of 2nd-place showings in slalom races.

“I was speechless. It was unbe-lievable,” says the Mont-Ste-Marie athlete. “I am super excited. This is a dream for me.”

Ottawa schools also produced impressive results in the Level 1 or school-only-trained alpine events.

Elmwood’s Allegra Richter won the girls’ slalom while Bell’s Cat Wang was 2nd, helping her Bruins to the bronze medal in the team competition along-side Emma Zhang, Katie Devenny, Holly Sandvold and Marley Cameron.

Andrew Popov (6th), Jack Rabb (11th) and Garrett Fiander (35th), along with Andrew McCaw and Ker-rigan Rowan earned Level 1 boys’ sla-lom bronze for South Carleton.

NEW HIGH FOR GLB NORDIC

Down the road from Blue Moun-

tain, site of the OFSAA alpine event, the national capital’s nordic skiers harvested more gold, silver and bronze on the trails of the Highlands Nordic Ski Club in Duntroon.

Two-time defending champions in both the junior and senior categories, the Glebe Gryphons girls found a new way to outdo themselves at this year’s competition by entering a second set of four-member ’B’ teams.

The Glebe senior girls displayed their outrageous depth by winning both the gold and silver medals in the team competition, led by individual champion Ali Pouw along with Kath-erine Marshall (8th), Hanna Smith (11th) and Keili Shepherd (13th), and the second team of Katherine Clarke

(20th), Reilly McClure (21st), Cassidy Grimes (29th), Kendall Saravanamut-too (35th).

The two-team strategy didn’t pan out quite as well for the Gryphons junior girls. Glebe was worthy of the silver medal spot, but instead finished 4th and 5th. Had the top finish from the four-member ‘B’ squad counted amongst the ‘A’ lineup’s results, the top team would have placed 2nd.

The Nepean junior girls (Kath-erine Mason, Ella Barney, Alexan-dra Sproule and Rachel Hornung) grabbed the team bronze medal.

All four members of the champion Glebe junior boys’ team finished ahead of all skiers from 2nd-place Parry Sound for a massive 84-point win. Ben

Milley was the individual bronze medal-list, Cameron Pouw was 6th, and Sam Lyon 9th and Carter Saunders 11th.

The Gryphons senior boys were a dominant force as well, with their ‘A’ team winning gold and their ‘B’ entry taking bronze. Pierre Grall-Johnson, Darion Dillabaugh, Teagan Harris and Dawson Lyon were the gold medal-lists, while Evan Kealey, Finn Perrault, Ezra Pierce and Liam Powers-Kelly were bronzed.

Earl of March’s Aiden Kirkham was the senior boys’ individual cham-pion, while Lisgar’s Alia Sanger won senior girls’ bronze.

In the relay competitions, Glebe’s senior girls again finished 1-2, Glebe’s ‘B’ team took senior boys’ silver, Glebe’s junior girls did get a silver in the end, Nepean’s junior girls earned a second bronze, Glebe’s junior boys were champions and Nepean’s junior boys (Sander van Walraven, Sebas-tien Nicolle, Conor Jacobson and Jonathan Hadwen also got on the po-dium as relay silver medallists.

2 LOCAL WRESTLING BRONZE

At the March 1-2 OFSAA wrest-ling championships in Windsor, Cair-ine Wilson’s Abrahim Ntijem (72 kg boys) and Merivale’s Klara Patel (67.5 kg girls) were both bronze medallists.

Louis-Riel alpine boys & Glebe nordic girls dominate ski OFSAAsBy Anne Duggan OFSAA nordic champion Ali Pouw.

photo: dan plouffe

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