McGrath is QUFL coach of the year
Gerry McGrath on the job.
photo by shana jean
Despite a loss in the Dunsmore Cup to the Laval Rouge et Or, the Concordia Stingers football team gained a lot of admiration from football analysts and fans this season. Originally unranked in the Canadian Interuniversity Sport’s top-10, the Stingers soared up to rank as high as fourth in the country at one point before ending the season ranked sixth.
Now Gerry McGrath is being honoured for his great coaching. He was chosen by a panel of journalists, head coaches and athletic directors as the Quebec University Football League coach of the year. McGrath, who’s been head coach of the Stingers football team since 2000, said he attributes the team’s success to his staff and Concordia’s Athletics Department.
“Football’s the ultimate team game,” he said. “Individual awards don’t mean that much.”
Finishing the season with a 6-2 record, McGrath said his team “showed improvement throughout the year,” but he couldn’t hide his disappointment with the loss to Laval. Had the Stingers won, the team would have been one win shy of making Concordia’s second appearance ever in the Vanier Cup.
“He’s a very good coach and a great man to work for,” said Warren Craney, the Stingers’ assistant coach, who been working under McGrath since the 2000 season. Despite this, the Stingers head coach said that he’s just “doing his job.”
The award also makes McGrath the Quebec conference nominee for the Frank Tindall Trophy as the Canadian interuniversity coach of the year. The award will be presented this week during the Vanier Cup festivities in Saskatoon.
Two other Stingers are also up for awards. Middle-linebacker Patrick Donovan is hoping to claim the Presidents’ Trophy for the second year in a row as the CIS’s outstanding defensive player, and slotback Nick Scissons is nominated for the Russ Jackson Award for best combining football, academic achievement and community service.
Donovan, who has been with the team since 2001, is one of six Stingers who will not be returning to the lineup next year. He missed the Stingers’ last two games of the season thanks to a groin injury, but played in their two playoff games despite the pain. He finished with the league’s best tackles per game ranking, averaging six tackles a game.
Scissons was originally going to join the St. Mary’s Huskies in 2003, but changed his mind after having conversations with his mother and McGrath.
“We were recruiting him pretty hard,” McGrath recalled. “He’s a tremendous young man.”
This season, Scissons finished second on the team with 16 receptions for 271 yards. He majors in history, his cumulative grade point average is 3.45, and he is currently organizing a program for AIDS Community Cares Montreal that aims to help volunteers deal with work-related stress through peer counselling.