Monday, July 26, 2021

From Little Big Four to NCAFA

The article below from the September 30th, 1955, Ottawa Journal is perhaps the first about the organization which would become the National Capital Amateur Football Association.


In August 1969, the Ottawa Citizen reported that this league and the subsequently-formed Ottawa Mosquito League would merge to form the Ottawa Minor Football Association. They appear to have added "Carleton" to the name in 1976 (therefore becoming OCMFA). The NCAFA name is first in use, from what I've found, in 1994.

The Citizen also had an article about the formation of the league in 1955 but only on October 7th of that year, so the Journal had the proverbial "scoop" by a few days.

The image below is from the October 14th edition of the Citizen.


Wednesday, July 21, 2021

1953 Red Feather Tournament: Fisher Park 34, Alliston Memorial 00

Recent posts about the National Capital Bowl brought the Red Feather Tournament to mind so we'll take another step forward with recording that event's history.

Fisher Park represented the area that year and based on the score, did so handsomely. It should be pointed out that Alliston was a replacement participant. A team from Oshawa was supposed to attend but were disqualified from doing so due to a rules violation.


Despite the lopsided score, Fisher did not take the trophy home. Perhaps Alliston being a substitute participant played a part in that. Here's how the Fisher Park Boys performed, regardless.



Sunday, July 18, 2021

2005: St. Peter Becomes The First NCSSAA Team To Win A National Capital Bowl

Following the post from Thursday, July 15th, about St. Mark's National Capital Bowl victory, I needed to refresh my memory about the history of this series of Bowl games.

It didn't take very long. The previous year, Martin Cleary provided all the details while covering St. Peter's success in that game for the Ottawa Citizen, including past participants. That was very handy. 


Photo by Ian Macalpine for the Kingston Whig-Standard


Thursday, July 15, 2021

2006: St. Mark Lions Win the National Capital Bowl

The High School page above tends to focus on local results but the article and accompanying image copied here gave me the idea to include recent National Capital Bowl results as well. Results from the EOSSAA games from the 40s are noted, why wouldn't these be?

I'll do that as I happen across them but in the meantime, enjoy reading about an ending that had to be simultaneously mystifying and stress-inducing for Lions coach Paul Brown. 😬


Monday, July 12, 2021

Just Added: 1988 Bootleggers Game Summaries

Four newspaper articles have been added to the Bootleggers page, including the one below, all recapping games from the 1988 season. There have been one or two very brief ones (as they tended to be at the time, frustratingly) added for the 1992 season as well.

Coincidentally, they are all against one of two teams; either the Binghamton Jets or the Watertown Red & Black. Not surprisingly, I think all but one mentions a significant contribution by receiver Jamie Straw. 😉


Friday, July 9, 2021

No Junior Football in 2021

The following is copied from the Sooners Facebook group


We regret to announce that the Ottawa CJFL Sooners team of the OFC will not be participating in the 2021 football season. Due to the tremendous uncertainty with the ever changing Novel Coronavirus landscape, The Ottawa Sooners have chosen to remain responsible for the health and well being of our players, staff and volunteers.

Several factors lead us to make this difficult decision, the main factor being that as an Ottawa based club, our participation would require several away games with visits spanning across several public health units in Ontario.

As vaccinations progress in Ontario and our active recruiting efforts continue, the Ottawa Sooners have high expectations for an amazing return to action in the 2022 season.

Although this was a difficult decision to make, the Ottawa Sooners feel that is paramount to put the health and safety of our players and their families, our coaching staff and our volunteers first.

The Ottawa Sooners have, alternately, chosen to implement an intensive training and team building program that will allow us to better prepare for next season without excessive exposure. This program will coincide with our local Covid19 guidelines.

We would like to assure everyone in the CJFL and OFC that the Ottawa Sooners are committed and excited for our return to the gridiron in the 2022 season.

We appreciate the continued support and we thank you in advance of your understanding.

The Ottawa Sooners look forward to seeing everyone in 2022!!

The Ottawa Jr. Riders cancelled their season (or rather, the QMJFL did) earlier this year as well so that's it for that.

I noticed a couple of weeks back that the Sooners no longer appear on the OPFL website as a varsity club, either, so it seemed likely that this was going to be the path they would follow and it's very, very unfortunate. 

Thursday, July 8, 2021

The 1942 RCAF Flyers

The 1929 shutdown of the Rideau Aquatic Club's football program, a self-inflicted punishment for a postgame brawl at the conclusion of a national semi-final game against a team from St. Thomas, appeared to be a killing blow for junior football in the city.

That turned out to not be the case. In fact, junior football only disappeared for one year.

In 1931, a new junior league sprang up featuring six teams. I initially thought that it had lasted only a season or two but while tracking down its results, I came to find that it ran until 1941. A rough page has now been built for it though at the moment it's little more than a skeleton.

Not surprisingly, the league did not run in 1942 during World War II, much like the professional football unions. Ottawa did have a three-team senior league, however, involving the Rough Riders, members from the Air Force and a team of civil servants.


This league only lasted one season. Each team played the other two twice each so there's little to report.

It wasn't without its highlights though. The Rough Riders defeated the RCAF team 18-00 in the first weekend's action. RCAF would then play the Civil Servants a week later with a special guest star hanging around.


There's the two-time All-Star (at the time), the previous year's recipient of the Jeff Russell Memorial Trophy and the Lionel Conacher Award and 1940 Grey Cup champion Tony Golab, home on leave, just casually chilling with the RCAF lads. Could he bring a little star power to the proceedings?


And he did that very thing for the November 7th game against the Civil Service. 



Both the Rough Riders and Flyers ended the regular season with 3-1 records (and the poor Civil Service team was winless with eight points for and 89 scored against) so they met in a playoff, won by RCAF.





Unfortunately, our RCAF club would lose to Toronto's (the Hurricanes) the following weekend in Toronto by a score of 18-13 and therefore fail to qualify to play for the Grey Cup. 

That was it for the Flyers. The following year, a team named the Combines joined the Ontario Rugby Football Union. They became the Trojans in 1944 and eventually merged with the Ottawa Rough Riders. All that is recorded in the "Ottawa Trojans (1943-1947)" page above.