McConkey, Flory react to cancellation of 2020 Canada West football season

Mark McConkey went out on his own terms after the 2013 Canada West football season.

A record-setting receiver with the University of Regina Rams, McConkey moved on after exhausting his university eligibility.

Perhaps that’s why he was so disappointed Monday after hearing that Canada West had cancelled the 2020 football season due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now the Rams’ interim head coach, McConkey knows a handful of players on the team’s roster will have to leave the program without playing one final season.

“That’s the toughest part for me,” McConkey said. “Some guys’ football careers may end because of this, which is super-unfortunate.

“No one wants to end their career this way. Guys like to hang up the cleats in the way they want it to end. My heart goes out to those fifth-year guys.”

Three U Sports leagues — Canada West, Ontario University Athletics and Atlantic University Sport — all have voted to cancel their fall seasons. As a result, sports like football, soccer and rugby were cancelled.

U Sports already has agreed to give every athlete another year of eligibility, meaning players who were to enter their fifth and final seasons of eligibility could return in 2021 if they so choose. But football has an age cap of 25, so anyone who reaches that age as of Sept. 1 of a season is ineligible to play.

U Sports reportedly is discussing that rule as it pertains to the situation created by COVID-19, but it’s unclear what decision might be reached.

“It’s that unknown that’s just causing so many questions and that’s where a lot of the frustration — and warranted frustration — is really coming from,” University of Saskatchewan Huskies head coach Scott Flory told The Green Zone’s Jamie Nye.

Flory admitted he was hoping Canada West would delay making a final decision on the 2020 season, but he understood the conference eventually had to make a choice.

Now that a decision has been made, however, coaches like Flory and McConkey have to figure out what it means to recruiting for the 2021 season and beyond.

“There’s going to be a cascading, trickle-down effect; there’s no doubt about it,” Flory said. “I don’t know if that was on the frontal lobe when the decision was made because it was about health and safety — and rightfully so. But the unintended consequences that come out of a major decision like this can be vast and far-reaching and they can affect a lot of guys.”

One consequence that concerns Flory is the potential loss of players to other programs.

If the NCAA or Canadian Junior Football League opt to go ahead with their 2020 seasons, players could leave Canada West teams for those greener pastures.

“That’s the tough part is that you can’t ever fault a young man for wanting to continue to play the game,” Flory said. “We’ve got to do our best in their best interests as well as ourselves and the program and try our best to navigate those waters.”

McConkey said he was concerned about the student-athletes’ schooling — both Saskatchewan universities already have said classes will be done remotely in the fall — and about them missing out on the whole university experience if they’re at home.

In his mind, there also is a question about the players’ future in the game.

“It’s kind of a year off for these guys, a year’s gap in their experience, which hopefully is not going to be too detrimental to their skill development as they go on that path of the CFL draft and chasing the dream of playing professional football,” McConkey said.

Both head coaches said their initial thoughts upon hearing Monday’s news were about their players and the impact the cancellation of the season would have on them.

“I’m an old guy — I had my chance to play the game — but I was trying to put myself in their shoes,” said Flory, who played 15 seasons in the CFL after spending five seasons on the Huskies’ offensive line.

“If I’m 20, 21, 22 and not given the opportunity to compete and play the game I love and have that passion for and (there are) just so many questions coming out of (the decision), it’s heartbreaking for these guys.”

Lisa Robertson, the U of R’s director of sport, community engagement and athlete development, told Nye she’s “extremely optimistic” that there will be a 2021 season for all the fall sports and that all of the school’s student-athletes will return for that campaign.

McConkey hopes that she’s correct — and that the decision announced Monday was the correct one, too.

“Hopefully in a few years we can look back and really understand that we did the right thing at this point in time,” he said.

— With files from 650 CKOM’s Brady Lang