U Sports Football Report (Conference Finals)
It hasn’t been the most exciting season in Canadian University Football as there have been predictable endings to most conference battles.
These battles were barely battles at all with the best teams taking conference titles fairly easily.
It was the same in the playoffs as the big teams were able to find their way to the conference finals.
That type of season led to a serious question about just how good the finals would be for these teams.
Western, Laval and Calgary were all expected to win their championships while the Saint Mary’s Huskies had been impressive all season.
It seemed almost obvious what the matchups were going to be when the teams found their way to the national stage.
That is where things were going to get interesting as the best teams were going to face off for the right to play in the Vanier Cup.
Before that, there was really no other reason to watch as it was going to be a boring weekend in U Sports Football.
There was always an idea that something unexpected could happen though as that is the nature of sports, especially football.
With single-elimination games, any team can come prepared to unseat the best teams in the country and this weekend that is what happened.
For the most part, things went predictably as two of the biggest programs found their way to the national playoffs.
The Western Mustangs were the team on the easiest path as they had gone through the season without losing a game.
Nobody had come close to beating them and nobody expected their Yates Cup Final to be any type of challenge.
The Gryphons wanted to be up for it but they couldn’t handle the Mustangs with Western taking a 63-14 win.
It was the more obvious of the games and the Gryphons were not able to launch the surprise to stop the Mustangs from their Vanier Cup bid.
In Quebec, things were a little more interesting as the Laval Rouge et Or were the best team in the province but the Montreal Carabins had the ability to challenge them.
The Rouge et Or have had to deal with the Carabins for the last few years as the only team to beat them in the Dunsmore Cup.
Laval didn’t quite run through the Carabins but they did win convincingly taking a 14-1 win and another Dunsmore Cup.
Two of the big three had made it through the championships as expected but it was in the west that things finally got interesting.
The Calgary Dinos were the clear favourite to win another Hardy Trophy as they were another team that walked through the season.
They were going to take on a good team in Saskatchewan but like the other big programs, the Dinos seemed untouchable.
The Huskies proved everyone wrong as they were able to not only match the Dinos but overpower them.
The Huskies took a 43-18 win leaving little doubt that they were the best team in the CanWest division this year.
Despite the dominance of the Dinos throughout the season it wasn’t enough to carry them to the national playoffs.
It was the first real major surprise of the year as for the first time one of the big three programs was not on the winning end.
Now the Huskies look to continue to be the spoilers as they will take on the Mustangs in the Uteck Bowl next weekend.
Meanwhile, the StFx X-Men are looking to be their own spoilers as they were able to beat the Saint Mary’s Huskies in another surprise, albeit a smaller one than in the west.
The X-Men will need to take on the biggest program in Laval looking to launch the biggest upset in recent memory.
That will leave the Vanier Cup with plenty of possibilities but two very different and very interesting ones.
The Vanier Cup could see two underdogs facing off against each other or two of the most powerful programs.
Anything in between could also happen as the western finals showed that single games can lead to anything and with more on the line, the bowls could get interesting.
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