Caroline Marsh

Short passing the torch: Stingers fill soccer vacancies from within

Local Journalism Initiative / The Link / February 27, 2025 / Caroline Marsh, Dusty Goldbery, Kouyabe Ignegongba, Soccer, Stingers, Wilfried Monthe

The Stingers have found their new head soccer coaches. Photo Caroline Marsh

Dusty Goldberg,
Local Journalism Initiative

Kouyabe Ignegongba and Wilfried Monthe named new Stingers men’s and women’s coaches

The Concordia University Stingers soccer teams have their new head coaches.

Wilfried Monthe has been named the head coach of the women’s soccer team, and Kouyabe Ignegongba has been named head coach of the men’s team. Monthe and Ignegongba were originally assistant coaches for the women’s and men’s programs, respectively.

“Both these guys have been under my wing for some time now,” said Concordia director of soccer Greg Sutton, who was responsible for recruiting both coaches to the program. “We have a good relationship, a good trust, and I think we’re on the same wavelength of our ideas of the game and how we treat our student-athletes.”

Monthe’s passion for soccer has taken him to various continents. He was born in Cameroon but moved to France to pursue soccer. He played for FC Metz, a French football club, before bouncing around various North American teams in places like Colorado and Ohio in the US and Quebec’s Trois-Rivières. He would eventually stop playing due to a concussion and moved back to Montreal to pursue a coaching career.

Along with practical experience, Monthe draws on traditional education as a coach as well. He studied at Cégep du Vieux Montréal, the University of Maine and Stanford University in California.

“I studied in the psychological field, so that really helps me get the most out of my players,” Monthe said. “I’m more focused on communication […] it makes it easier for me to connect with the players and understand their needs.”

After six years as an assistant coach, Monthe officially became the head coach of the women’s team in early October 2024. He was offered the title at the beginning of the season but had prior engagements. Up until recently, he was the head coach of John Abbott College’s women’s soccer team and had promised to see the season out before taking on his new role.

“I felt like the timing was good too, for me to step up, because we [had] a good season [at] Abbott,” Monthe said. “They’re gonna get back to Division 1 next year, and I felt like I did what I had to do.”

Ignegongba too has had his fair share of travel. Born in N’Djamena, Chad, Ignegongba would also eventually travel to North America for soccer. He started as a player for Bunker Hill Community College in Boston, before moving to Montreal and enrolling at Concordia. He spent five years playing for the Stingers while studying biology. He eventually joined Sutton’s staff and spent seven years as an assistant coach.

Ignegongba believes the step to the program’s success is to create a friendly and uplifting environment for student-athletes.

“The idea is really for the players to feel at home, to develop an identity, to also feel like part of the program, and to feel like Stingers,” Ignegongba said.

Right now, the new coaches are making good use of their training season, and have noted that their players are in a winning mindset. Both the men’s and women’s teams finished with win percentages below .500 in the 2024 season. Despite this, Ignegongba is optimistic about the future of Stingers soccer.

“You have to lose a couple of times to learn how to win,” Ignegongba said. “Every great sports team that’s managed to achieve success, it’s through consistency.”

This article originally appeared in Volume 45, Issue 9, published February 11, 2025.

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Jessymaude Drapeau chosen for coaching program

Local Journalism Initiative / The Link / October 6, 2024 / Caroline Marsh, Concordia Stingers, Jared Lackman-Mincoff, Jessymaude Drapeau

Stingers forward Jessymaude Drapeau manoeuvres past X-Women players. Photo Caroline Marsh

Jared Lackman-Mincoff,
Local Journalism Initiative

She becomes the third Stinger selected since 2021

Alexandra Boulanger, Emmy Fecteau and now Jessymaude Drapeau.

Concordia Stingers women’s hockey forward Drapeau is one of the nine players country-wide who will take part in the Creating Coaches program, U Sports announced on Sept. 19.

“It’s a great opportunity,” Drapeau said. “There aren’t a lot of people who have access to this training, so I’m really happy to have been chosen.”

The program runs for two years. Drapeau will receive training through the end of the 2025-26 season. Stingers head coach Julie Chu and associate head coach Caroline Ouellette approached Drapeau about applying for the program over the summer.

“[Drapeau] has continually shown how dedicated she can be […] as a student-athlete and I have no doubt that she will be that as a coach,” Chu said.

Drapeau becomes the third Concordia Stinger selected for the program since its inception in 2021. Boulanger was included in the program’s inaugural cohort in 2021, and is now an assistant coach at Bishop’s University. Fecteau was part of the 2023 cohort and was selected 31st overall by New York in the 2024 Professional Women’s Hockey League draft.

“The fact that we’ve been able to have three really great people and candidates within our program that are interested in coaching and really want to put that extra time and effort into it, it’s really special,” Chu said.

The program usually selects eight women’s hockey players from across Canada, two from each of the four conferences. However this year, nine players were selected, with Drapeau being the only representative from the Réseau du sport étudiant du Québec.

“By stepping into coaching roles, they are helping to build a stronger, more inclusive sports community across Canada,” U Sports chief executive officer Pierre Arsenault said in the Sept. 19 press release.

Drapeau will undergo her training with the under-13 Lac St-Louis Warriors, a peewee double-A girls’ team in Montreal. On top of her student-athlete schedule and regular meetings with other members of the program, Drapeau’s responsibilities with the Warriors include attending one practice per week and being behind the bench for at least three games per month.

“[Creating Coaches] knows that we’re university athletes,” Drapeau said. “School and our hockey come before this, so they try to be accommodating to our schedules.”

Drapeau has been coaching since she was in CEGEP. She coached midget under-18 and she coaches during Concordia’s summer camps alongside Ouellette.

Chu said she is excited that Drapeau’s selection will give more exposure to the Stingers program, and that it will also help her better understand the many aspects of coaching and how the game is different from a peewee level up to the university level.

“[Drapeau]’s going to love it, and she’s going to be very excited to be able to grow in those capacities,” Chu said.

Drapeau said she is looking forward to being an example for young athletes to follow, on top of sharpening her own abilities.

“I’ve started to understand more in recent years that the more women role models they have, the more young girls will want to stay [in hockey],” Drapeau said. “They’re going to follow your example as well.”

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