Eight teams. Eight proud histories. But in the end there can be only one. We’re searching for Canada’s greatest football program. And your vote will help decide the winner.
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LAVAL
Schools have a tendency to give their mascots silly names. The University of Toronto has a beaver named Trevor True Blue. Queen’s has Boo Hoo, a tartan-hatted bear. Western has a white and purple mustang who answers to the name JW. They’re all very cuddly creatures, though none truly captures the essence of its school’s identity like Victor, the mildly insane-looking bird who patrols Université Laval’s sidelines during games. But it’s not the mischief in his eyes or the feathers coming out his ears that make him synonymous with his school. It’s just his name. Victor stands for victory, just like Laval itself.
Laval may be the oldest post-secondary institution in the country, but the school’s football program is only 17. In their first season in 1996, the newly helmeted Rouge et Or went 1-8. In their fourth, they won a national title by beating St. Mary’s 14–10 in Toronto. So say what you will about the lack of heritage Laval brings to the college gridiron—this school has achieved more in its short lifespan than its rivals have accomplished over the past five decades. With 11 conference titles, a .752 all-time winning percentage and a record seven Vanier Cups, the Rouge et Or are the most dominant team in CIS.
And since no other school in Canada seems able to compete with them on the field, many trash the Quebec City–based school with tired criticisms about how their athletics programs are too rich and have too much of a lock on coveted French-Canadian athletes. Yes, Laval’s athletics program is one of the wealthiest in the country, allowing the football team to operate on a $2-million budget. But the majority of that budget comes from community outreach and fundraising. So the real strength of the program isn’t its ability to buy Vanier Cup wins, but rather the efficacy with which they have gained the community’s support.
No other school enjoys such a large and financially supportive fan base (an average of 14,257 attended the team’s home games in 2012), which has allowed Laval to invest in equipment, coaches and recruitment techniques. But none of this equals cheating, and the athletic directors of other universities are quick to admit that they’re the ones who now have to catch up. Until they do, it’s likely the Rouge et Or will continue to dominate on gridirons across the country and build on their short but sterling resumé.
–Brett Popplewell
ROUGE ET OR BY THE NUMBERS:
Vanier Cup wins: 7
Vanier Cup appearances: 8
Conference titles: 11
CIS MOPs: 1
NFL players produced: 0
CFL players produced: 30 (37 drafted)
All-time winning percentage: .752
TORONTO
The University of Toronto Varsity Blues can stake their claim to the top slot in the echelon of CIS football franchises by reason of history in its most basic sense: They started first, 152 years ago, in a game that took place at Queen’s Park, where the Ontario Legislative Building now stands. The Blues could also claim to have the most illustrious of alumni, including a prime minister (Lester B. Pearson), a premier (Bill Davis) and a Supreme Court justice (John Sopinka). And while other universities can boast about more Vanier Cup wins, consider the fact that U of T won four Grey Cups back when students and pros played on the same fields.
Given their history, it’s hard to imagine that the Blues’ program was almost scrapped deep into its second century, but that was indeed the case in its 131st season. The U of T administration announced that the storied team would be sacrificed in a round of budget cuts. Thus did a bunch of players go into the fall of 1992 thinking they were going to be the last team ever to play at Varsity Stadium. “We all had a sense of disbelief when we got the news,” says Murray Sobko, a record-setting receiver who was in his fourth year back in ’92. “We were young guys and football was for a lot of us at least 50 percent of the reason that we went to school. It was hard to accept that we were going to lose that, and that other student-athletes at our school weren’t going to get a chance to play there.”
Alumni rallied behind the cause and the Varsity Blues got a second life in ’93, something like Cinderella getting a chance to stay after midnight. Sobko and a few others returned to play fifth years for the team while working on graduate degrees. “It really became a rallying point for us,” he says. “It built a unity among us that wasn’t like other teams I played on.”
The Blues went 8-1 during the ’93 regular season, surviving some close contests and losing only to the always-powerful University of Western Ontario Mustangs. In the playoffs, though, U of T went to Western and beat the favoured Mustangs 24–16 on a snow-covered field in the Yates Cup. “To beat Western for the first time was a real satisfaction but, more than that, it gave us a sense that anything was possible,” Sobko says. U of T then went on to beat Concordia in the Churchill Cup and University of Calgary in the Vanier Cup, both games played at the SkyDome in front of the Blues’ friends and family—somehow fitting that a team that beat extinction secured its greatest championship against the Dinosaurs.
–Gare Joyce
VARSITY BLUES BY THE NUMBERS:
Vanier Cup wins: 2
Vanier Cup appearances: 3
Conference titles: 25
CIS MOPs: 4
NFL players produced: 0
CFL players produced: 203 drafted
All-time winning percentage: .558