2022 Jr. Rider All-Stars!

It may seem late to reveal these, but they only appeared on the league's website on April 2nd. I believe the QMJFL tends to announce their all-star teams as part of the launch of the upcoming season, typically. Hell, I've taken to seeing it as a sign that spring has finally arrived! 😋  

A subsequent post on the league's site named their individual award winners as well. Here they are. 

The Ottawa Sooners 1972 Playoff Series vs Verdun

The Sooners joined the Quebec junior league in 1972 and made their presence felt in short order. They lost their first two games but ultimately racked up a 6-3 regular season record then marched their way through the playoffs to secure the league's championship. 

Their first playoff contest was a  single elimination match against the Laval Cobras, won 36-00. That lead to the two-game series against Verdun copied below and now linked to on the Sooners 1960-1980 page. 

October 15th

October 22nd

This would be followed by a loss to Ontario champion Hamilton the following weekend.

Sept 29th, 2001: Sooners 16, Jr. Riders 15 (OT)

By broadening my search, I've now managed to track down all the Jr. Riders results from 1997 to 2001 inclusively. The Gazette newspaper from Montreal was very helpful in nailing down the few missing scores that had eluded me until last night.

There were a few game summaries added as well, though many are just a single paragraph rundown of the players who scored. Some weren't even that detailed, they were essentially a confirmation of the score, the team's place in the standings, and their next opponent. I didn't bother copying those.

There is a discrepancy that I can't seem to figure out though; The official standings I've seen for that season display the Riders at 6-1-1 but...I can't find a tie among their results. The closest is the game below which even mentions that the Riders were 4-2 as a result of that overtime loss against the Sooners. 

My guess is that this game was misidentified as a tie by someone.

The Sooners would win another one-point game against the Jr. Riders in the Manson Cup, after which the Jr. Riders moved to the Ontario Football Conference on the Canadian Junior League. More on that later but for now, their first era is about as fully recorded here as it's going to be. 

As for the Sooners, I'd started to wonder about the state of their big comeback because they'd been so quiet since the announcement but they returned to social media this past week, including a new Instagram account.

I find the hashtags used encouraging here. They appear to be aiming to restore teams at the varsity level (OSFL, Ontario Summer Football League) and senior/semi-pro (NFC, Northern Football Conference) as well as their standard junior club. I thought they might focus on the junior club initially then expand from there but that doesn't seem to be the case. It looks like steam ahead. Great news unless I'm making too much of a couple of hashtags.  

1998: Ottawa Jr. Riders 37, Sooners 02

Today's additions (at least thus far) were applied to both the Ottawa Sooners and Ottawa Jr. Riders pages.

In the case of the former, 1998 was hardly a banner year. They closed it out with a 2-6 regular season record, made the playoffs regardless, but were ousted in short order by the Chateauguay Raiders. Nonetheless, the scores from that season are now added to the Sooners' page so we have most of the team's results dating back to 1960 to that date. Pretty happy about that.

The Jr Riders, however, cemented their spot on the football landscape that year. They reached the championship game in 1997 after a 6-4 regular season but lost to the Sooners in that game. They pummeled the Sooners in their second contest of 1998 in what was seen as something of a changing of the guard.

Sigmund Charles of the Ottawa Sooners takes a pounding from Jarrid Foley, left, of the Ottawa Junior Riders yesterday. The Riders dealt the Sooners a humiliating 37-2 loss. Photo by Chris Mikula, Ottawa Citizen.   

Not the Sooners' finest hour and I suspect there were several factors contributing to the poor showing that season but I won't speculate. The Jr. Riders, meanwhile, again collected six regular season wins against two losses, both to the Chateauguay Raiders.

Those losses would be avenged when the Riders beat the Raiders 24-09 in the championship game. That recap has been included on their page for some time, but the summary of their semi-final win against the North Shore Broncos is now added. 

1997 QMJFL Championship: Sooners 13, Jr. Riders 07

I thought this game summary had been posted years ago but I'm unable to find any sign of it. In light of how many "firsts" took place that season (1997 was the first Jr. Riders season and therefore their first playoff appearance, it was the first Sooners Quebec crown, etc.), I'm surprised it wasn't added early on.

Out of curiosity, I tried to locate the game summary in the Montreal Gazette. It was a mighty struggle because two Ottawa-based teams in the Quebec league probably didn't sit well.

Sure enough, it generated all of two paragraphs containing 56 words in total, by my count. 😉  If they found it difficult to swallow, the next few years would be awful hard on them indeed. 

Just Added: Ottawa Jr. Riders 35, Ottawa Sooners 20, 1999 QMJFL Semifinal

The Ottawa Jr Riders and Ottawa Sooners traded punches for a few years when both clubs played out of the Quebec Junior Football League but 1999 most definitely belonged to the Riders. They won both regular season contests that year by scores of 42-07 and 42-14.

The semifinal was closer but still very clearly the Jr Riders' game. Read on. 

The Riders would thump the Chateauguay Raiders the following week in the league's championship game. That recap has been on the Jr Riders page for some time.

2000: Jr Riders 29, North Shore Broncos 22, QMJFL Championship Game

Aside from the CFL draft, there hasn't been a lot of football activity these days, as we're all painfully aware.

If I can find a silver lining, it is that I've put in plenty of time adding historical info for the various levels of play throughout the site. That includes...

• Adding game results (scores) for the Gee-Gees, Ravens and Sooners, mostly throughout the 60s and 70s.
• Adding Ottawa Citizen or Ottawa Journal game recaps to a few Panda Games.
• Adding Ottawa Citizen or Ottawa Journal game recaps for high school champions right up to about 2010. That page is almost done.

More specific to today, I've spent a bit of time adding to the Jr. Riders page, but also removing something I'd put on there a few weeks ago.

First the newness: I've landed on, and copied, the Citizen's recap of the QMJFL 2000 championship win. Here it is below.

What's been removed from that page is any mention of the Gloucester Redskins, the junior club that preceded the Jr. Riders by a couple of years. What little information I'd been able to dig up on Gloucester was moved to the "defunct clubs" page. 

Some accounts of Jr. Riders history that I've come across state that the Redskins "became" the Jr. Riders but that doesn't really appear to be the case. An article in the May 28th, 1990, Ottawa Citizen specified that the Redskins folded.

Everything was different about the new club, from name, uniforms, coaches, owners, and so on and so forth. I'm sure many players just went from one team to the other but that's hardly evidence of the rebranding of an existing club. The more information I locate, the harder it is to think of the Jr. Riders as an extension of the Redskins so they (Redskins) won't be included on a page specific to the Riders.

QMJFL Championship Game: Ottawa Jr. Riders 17, Chateauguay Raiders 07

The Jr. Riders overcame a 7-6 halftime deficit to secure their ninth league championship last night against long-time rival Chateauguay. I'll post more about the game when (or if) I come across more information.

1999 QMJFL Championship: Ottawa Jr. Riders 33, Chateauguay Raiders 09

The Ottawa Jr. Riders kicked off their season last night in Chateauguay. Unfortunately, they were on the wrong end of a 19-16 score.

These two teams have quite a bit of history. The article below is but one example of it. I wish it were more focused on the actual game than sideline...uhm...interactions between the two teams, but it will have to do for the moment.

It is likely too small to read as is, so click on the image then right click to open a larger version in a new window.

The Jr. Riders had defeated the Raiders in the previous year's championship game as well. If my record-keeping is sound, receiver Richard Tremblay was the league's outstanding offensive player and defensive back Scott Gordon its MVP.

1998 QMJFL Championship: Ottawa Jr. Riders 24, Chateauguay Raiders 09

While I enjoyed sharing results of the Ottawa Jr. Riders' most recent championship win, this site is intended to shine a little spotlight on past events more so than current ones.

With that in mind, I will now share that team's first such success from 1998, their second year of operation under that name.

The full results from the 1998 season will be added to the Jr Riders page shortly.

Dean Dorsey, the former Ottawa Rough Riders kicker, would step down as head coach following the season but the team remained quite successful with Dan Murphy, also a former Rough Rider, at the helm.

Tucker McCabe was named the league's rookie of the year and the following players were selected to be on the all-star team.

• Mike Borotsik - Centre
• Billy Conlin - OL
• Jacob Kyer - OL
• Richard Tremblay - WR
• Paul Fury - LB
• Steve Kasouf - LB
• Scott Gordon - FS

Scott Gordon went on to win a National Championship with the Gee-Gees in 2000. He was drafted in the second round of the 2002 draft by Calgary and played professionally through the 2009 season, mostly with Saskatchewan. He earned a Grey Cup ring with that team in 2007.