Jared Lackman-Mincoff

Potential policy change could harm U Sports men’s hockey

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , ,

Stingers centre Gabriel Proulx, faces off against a Gee-Gees player. Both are formerly from the QMJHL. Photo Alice Martin

Jared Lackman-Mincoff,
Local Journalism Initiative

Potential policy change could harm U Sports men’s hockey

U Sports men’s hockey could have a major obstacle coming its way.

Hockey writers have begun wondering about the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA)—which governs varsity athletics in the United States—possibly changing its amateurism policy to allow eligibility to junior hockey players from the Canadian Hockey League (CHL).

The NHL’s agreement with the CHL forces NHL teams to send their prospects back to their CHL teams if they are not yet ready for the NHL. Therefore, the junior level is filled with top NHL prospects already signed to their entry-level contracts.

CHL players receive stipends for their services, and go toe-to-toe with players already under professional contracts, deeming the entire league professional by NCAA standards. As such, players relinquish NCAA eligibility by playing a single CHL game.

Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman said in February, “We are headed towards a future of where CHL players are going to be able to play NCAA hockey. The question is when.”

CHL players that don’t make it to the NHL or another professional league often turn to U Sports hockey to continue playing hockey while pursuing higher education.

As a result, former CHL players make up the majority of U Sports men’s hockey rosters. Twenty-one out of the 25 members on the Concordia Stingers men’s hockey team previously played in the CHL.

“[The current policy] kind of protected us a little from losing talent down to the U.S. colleges,” said Concordia Athletics Director D’Arcy Ryan.

However, the NCAA’s inception of the name, image and likeness (NIL) rules in 2021—which allows athletes to receive compensation for their personal branding—incited a shift in leniency regarding amateur versus professional status of athletes.

CHL players would be attracted to American colleges rather than Canadian universities should they have the choice, largely because of the discrepancy in allowable scholarships.

Ryan explained that U Sports only allows scholarships to cover tuition and other compulsory academic fees, meaning that Canadian universities cannot offer much money to entice an athlete. “Whereas in the States, making living accommodations, room, board, all that would be covered. We can’t compete with that,” he said.

However, an NCAA policy change is not as simple as it may seem. The earliest the policy could be discussed is in April at the annual college hockey coaches conference. By that time, the U Sports men’s hockey recruitment cycle for 2024-25 will have mostly run its course.

It would also take some time yet for the policy to be changed. The decision would need to go through several different committees within the NCAA for approval and execution, according to Jim Connelly of United States College Hockey Online.

“This is something that we’re gonna talk about in April. We might vote on it in June, and then next December there’ll be a conference where somebody else will hear it and they’ll vote on it,” he said, adding that NCAA operations mimic parliamentary order.

But Adam Wodon, managing editor of College Hockey News, does not believe that the change will come from the NCAA itself. He thinks it is more likely that a CHL player sues the NCAA and demands to be made eligible.

“The NCAA keeps losing every court decision that there is,” he said. “That takes some kid playing [in the CHL] to say, ‘I want to go play in the NCAA. They’re not letting me, so I’m going to sue them.’ to do that. And then some court will say, ‘Yeah, you can’t stop them from going.’ And then it’s just open season at that point.”

U Sports declined The Link’s interview request and indicated that it has “no comment to make about media reports on a potential coaches association vote in the United States.”

UPDATE: In an earlier version of this article, Adam Wodon’s quote was mischaracterized. The Link regrets this error.

This article originally appeared in Volume 44, Issue 13, published April 2, 2024.

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Jessymaude Drapeau chosen for coaching program

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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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Lebanese Concordia students keep soccer dreams alive

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Concordia students Jad Harb (left) and Talal Selman (right) are co-founders of All Star Xperience. Photo Jared Lackman-Mincoff

Jared Lackman-Mincoff,
Local Journalism Initiative

Jad Harb and Talal Selman foster the soccer community they wish they had with All Star Xperience

Jad Harb and Talal Selman may have had their dreams uprooted by circumstances outside their control, but nothing was going to keep the two soccer lovers down.

Originally from Beirut, they both started playing soccer from a young age. For Selman, the pitch became his home at four years old, and he began playing for his school teams as a defender. Harb played with his friends on the street, soon following suit and becoming a goalkeeper at school.

“Going into it, I started thinking more that I want to do this as a living,” Harb said.

Saad Balhawan coached Harb starting in first grade and all the way through various levels of the Lebanese national team. Balhawan believed that Harb had the dedication and skill set for a successful soccer career, being one of the best national team players he had ever seen.

“He has passion. He loves football too much,” Balhawan said.

Balhawan trusted Harb so much that, during one tournament match, he had Harb play as a striker when his team needed a goal, and had him retreat to goalkeeper when he wanted to preserve the result.

Harb and Selman often faced each other, playing for rival schools and club teams. Both got to know each other well, but their friendship only truly took off when they became teammates on the under-20 Lebanese national team.

After joining the national team, they quickly adopted a new routine that included several practices and games per week. They felt comfortable. It felt as if their dream of playing professional soccer was within reach.

But their world came crashing down when they least expected it. The 2019 Lebanese financial crisis, one of the worst in recorded history, dashed their dreams.

“Everyone’s money got stuck in the banks and a lot of people who had money woke up the next day and didn’t have any more,” Selman said.

The COVID-19 pandemic and the Beirut port explosion in August 2020 only exacerbated this. 

Harb and Selman were teenagers who, by their own admission, did not fully understand what was going on. But it became brutally clear once the crisis altered their life paths.

“One day, I wake up, and my father tells me, ‘Listen, you’re not going to do your undergrad here. It’s too unstable. We don’t know what’s going to happen the next day,’” Selman said.

In the fall of 2021, Montreal became their new home. Currently, they are in their fourth year of industrial engineering at Concordia University. Sticking closely together, both share the same courses and assignments.

“If you go to any of our lectures,” Harb said, “you’ll see us sitting right beside each other, just talking about school or business.”

After arriving in Montreal, they were eager to keep soccer alive in their daily lives. They entered several tournaments and small leagues until they found teams that would take them in.

Selman began playing in 2023 for Mont-Royal Outremont, a semi-professional club in Quebec’s Ligue 1. Harb suited up in the same year for the Club de soccer Montréal Centre in the Ligue de soccer élite du Québec, one tier below Ligue 1.

With these new teams, they were able to keep doing what they loved most. However, they found it hard to find a sense of community within their respective roles.  

“We noticed that there was something missing,” Harb said. “We went into many tournaments here and leagues where you just go, pay the registration fee and then [organizers] don’t really listen to you.”

It was glaringly obvious that they were completely on their own.

Many of their friends were not as lucky as they were. Several had come to Montreal and, despite looking for ways to continue playing soccer, drew the short straw and eventually gave up.

“They were just [quitting],” Selman said. “We felt like it shouldn’t happen, and we should give them what they want.”

This is how All Star Xperience (ASX) came to be.

Harb and Selman founded the company in late 2023 with the goal of fostering a community of soccer players and giving newcomers more opportunities to continue on the pitch. 

“The first couple of tournaments we did were short tournaments. So, one-day tournaments or two-day tournaments,” Selman said. “We were just doing them to put our name out there.”

Their first tournament had only eight teams, composed exclusively of friends of Harb and Selman. Over time, ASX grew. People they didn’t know began sending them messages asking about their tournaments. They also decided to give out cash prizes, not because it attracts more people, but as a way of giving back and showing appreciation to their participants.

“We really touch on the emotional side of the base where we love our players,” Harb said. “And it’s not only just about playing soccer, it’s about building a whole community.”

The Concordia Student Union (CSU) reached out to the inseparable duo to set up the CSU All-Star Cup for Concordia students, as part of Orientation Week for the Fall 2024 semester. It is their biggest tournament yet, spanning two days with 20 teams and roughly 250 students participating.

Many who took part appreciate having an accessible tournament on campus.

“It’s a positive experience,” participating student Faysal Dandashli said. “It’s something that hasn’t really been done before. It’s a great way to meet others, connect with people.”

ASX is also putting on the 10-week ASX Premier League at Montreal’s Lower Canada College starting in early October.

Both Harb and Selman are happy with their playing careers at the moment. Harb mentioned that receiving a semi-professional contract would be a nice milestone to achieve, but he remains content with his current position.

The only thing truly missing from their sporting careers is donning the Concordia Stingers maroon and gold in their final two years of study.

“We played at elementary, middle school, high school level with all the teams,” Harb said. “It’s nice to represent our university.”

On the business side, they hope to grow ASX and host tournaments across Canada, perhaps even worldwide eventually.

“Soccer is the worldwide language of sports,” Harb said. “It should be open for everyone.”

This article originally appeared in Volume 45, Issue 2, published September 17, 2024.

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Stingers fueled by $100,000 alumnus donation

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Stingers quarterback Olivier Roy loads up for a pass during the Stingers football home opener against the Laval Rouge et Or. Photo Alice Martin

Jared Lackman-Mincoff,
Local Journalism Initiative

Former Concordia football player sets up student-athlete scholarship

When Al Fiumidinisi played for the Stingers football team in 1985, he faced a reality much different from his comfortable CEGEP life.

Playing football for Champlain Lennoxville in CEGEP, Fiumidinisi and all of his teammates lived on campus. They had a practical daily routine that allowed them to do everything they needed to on a given day.

“Classes would finish at 4 p.m. We’d have our practices from 5 p.m. until about 6:30 p.m., 7 p.m. Afterwards, we’d go to the cafeteria to eat and study, and go to bed,” Fiumidinisi said. “It was the perfect scenario.”

Not to mention that he was playing for one of the best CEGEP teams in the country at the time.

But once he arrived at Concordia, all of that changed.

He realized that, like himself, most of his teammates lived off-campus. He lived on Montreal’s North Shore and had to commute roughly three hours per day to and from the Loyola Campus, where his games and practices took place.

“It was taking me about an hour to an hour-and-a-half to get to school. And then I would go to my practices,” he said. “[B]y the time I got home, it would be 11:30 p.m., 12 a.m. I was exhausted.”

He really wanted to continue playing football, but quit after one year.

“I just couldn’t do all the travelling,” he said.

In June, almost 40 years after his time at Concordia, he donated $100,000 to the university,  designated as a scholarship for student-athletes. For the next 10 years, one member of the Stingers football team and one member of a Stingers women’s team will each receive a $5,000 scholarship.

Fiumidinisi—currently a senior portfolio manager at the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce—majored in finance and minored in accounting at Concordia. As such, he also instructed that the scholarships be awarded to student-athletes enrolled in a John Molson School of Business program.

Fiumidinisi remembers the difficulties of balancing his studies and sports, and wanted to help those who are going through the same struggles.

“Some people just like to build their bank account and get as much as they can. That’s not my game,” he said. “My kids are well taken care of, and everybody’s good. I think it’s good karma to give back.”

Fiumidinisi took out student loans to pay his tuition. He is hoping that the scholarship will help alleviate the recipients’ financial stress, and perhaps allow them to afford slightly higher rent.

“Instead of paying $1,000 [for] someplace really far away, maybe they could spend $2,000 and be much closer to campus and be able to do the sports they need to do,” he said.

The Stingers are used to receiving small, recurring donations from their alumni. Receiving large sums of money all at once usually only happens once a year on Giving Tuesday, an annual and well-known November tradition where the university encourages students, staff, and alumni to donate to its various departments.

“It’s always uplifting when we see alumni giving back based on the importance that they found and derived from the non-academic aspect of their time at Concordia,” Recreation and Athletics director D’Arcy Ryan said.

Ryan says that the new scholarship also holds practical value for the department.

“If we’re using it on the front end and deciding beforehand what team will get it on the women’s side, it can be used as a strong recruiting tool,” he said.

This is the single largest donation the Stingers have received since late 2022, according to Ryan, when Montreal-based Power Corporation of Canada donated $1.3 million to Concordia Stingers athletics. It aimed for the department to develop resources in women’s sports for nutrition, mental health and mentorship.

One member of the Stingers women’s hockey coaching staff, Devon Thompson, was able to hone her coaching skills and leadership abilities thanks to the donation.

In late 2021, former Stingers basketball player George Lengvari donated $1 million each to Concordia and McGill basketball programs.

“I’m kind of hoping [Fiumidinisi’s donation] has trickle-down effects with regards to other alumni looking to do something in a similar vein,” Ryan said.

The Stingers football coach will make a recommendation to the Concordia financial aid and awards office each year, while the women’s scholarship recipient will be decided by the Athletics department.

“These kids work hard. They spend 35 hours a week just doing football and they go to school,” said head football coach Brad Collinson. “Some of them have part-time jobs, so anytime we can relieve some financial stress from them, it’s important.”

The Stingers football team is allowed to hand out a maximum of 33 scholarships per academic year. This new scholarship does not add to that total, but it gives the team another one to work with.

Nevertheless, Collinson hopes that the winners will be inspired to pay it forward when their time comes.

“The winner of that will be very happy and very appreciative of what an alumnus did for them,” Collinson said. “And hopefully moving forward when they graduate, they’ll do the same.”

Fiumidinisi shares the same wish. He believes that everybody—not just Concordia alumni—should do their part in helping others.

“If everybody gave back, I think we’d live in a better place,” Fiumidinisi said.

This article originally appeared in Volume 45, Issue 1, published September 3, 2024.

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