Shootout in Montreal – Redmen Down Mustangs in Penalty-Filled Affair

Published on The CIS Blog on November 10, 2013.

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It was a cold, brisk evening in the city of Montréal on Saturday night, but inside McConnell Arena things better resembled the Wild West, as an all-out barnburner took place between the #5 McGill Redmen and #7 Western Mustangs.

Western was entering the game coming off of a tough loss in Ottawa against the Gee-Gees the night before where they were held off of the scoresheet until over midway through the second. In this one, they got started quickly to try to remedy that as Steven Reese scored just three and a half minutes in to get the Mustangs out in front early.

Following the goal, both teams started a long and lengthy parade to the penalty box that endured throughout the entire game, as special teams became a crucial part of both sides’ strategies.

And just under seven minutes after Reese gave Western the lead, McGill’s Neal Prokop scored on the powerplay to even things up. The goal came after Julian Cimadamore took a cross-checking penalty, the first of three straight calls against Western.
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Top Programs Kick Off Basketball Season in Ottawa

Published on The CIS Blog on November 6, 2013.

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Some of the top men’s and women’s basketball programs in the country opened their seasons in Ottawa this past weekend, including both defending CIS champions. Here’s our recap of those games:

Tough Start for Windsor

Following a strong regular season that saw them finish atop of the OUA West last season, the Windsor Lancers looked to rebound from a disappointing missed opportunity to play in the CIS Final 8 basketball championship last season as they lost to Lakehead in the OUA bronze medal game. However, things looked optimistic for the Lancers, who entered the season ranked sixth in the nation. Unfortunately for them, the schedulers weren’t so kind, forcing Windsor to open their season on the road at the opposite end of the province against the no. 1 Carleton Ravens and no. 3 Ottawa Gee-Gees.

Coming off of their ninth national championship in the past eleven years, it should be no surprise that the Ravens entered the season ranked atop of the CIS Top Ten. Led by legendary coach Dave Smart and a returning class of standouts including Phil and Thomas Scrubb, as well as Tyson Hinz, Carleton looks poised to contend in achieving their campaign of “Again for Ten.”

It was a high-profile affair to kick off the season at the Raven’s Nest, with a good-sized crowd walking into the arena on a red carpet draped with Ravens cheerleaders on either side while the band provided a traditional university sport soundtrack. A rendition of the national anthem before the game topped off the classy beginning, and the game began.

It took only four seconds for Carleton to put up their first points of the season, as Thomas Scrubb dunked the ball on a fast break off of tip-off. From there, Carleton never looked back, in a game that didn’t see a single lead change. Windsor was able to keep it close through the first quarter, trailing only 23-16.

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Rams Take Down Lions in Cross-City Clash

Published on The CIS Blog on November 4, 2013.

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The #9 York Lions and Ryerson Rams kicked off their cross-town rivalry on Halloween last week, in what looked to be a closely contested matchup with both teams entering the game at just one-loss apiece.

Strangely, the single loss for each team came courtesy the other team in the Toronto equation, the Varsity Blues.

Before the puck even dropped, there was a sense that this would be a heated game, as each team fought to catch #10 Lakehead at the top of the OUA’s West Division.

It didn’t take long for the scoring to get started, either. York’s Mike Lomba Continue reading →

Rivalry Renewed; Ravens Spoil Redmen Record Bid

Published on The CIS Blog on October 26, 2013.

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OTTAWA — Eleven minutes and nineteen seconds.

That’s how long No. 5 McGill needed to keep No. 9 Carleton scoreless in Friday night’s game to set a new OUA record for longest shutout sequence. If they made it to the end of the second period without allowing a goal, they’d overtake Alberta’s CIS record, set last season.

Carleton had other plans.

McGill looked poised to continue their three-game winning streak, which had propelled them to fifth in the national rankings after previously being unranked, when Cedric McNicoll opened the scoring on an early powerplay goal just two and a half minutes in.

Playing in front of a near-capacity crowd, the Ravens took over from there.
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State of the Journalism Industry – Highlights from the AEJMC

I have the fortunate opportunity to be spending this weekend in Washington, D.C., as I have been invited to the annual conference put on by the Association of Educators in Journalism and Mass Communication to present one of my papers.

This afternoon I was able to attend the conference highlight I was most looking forward to, a panel discussion on the state of the industry featuring Tom Rosenstiel of the American Press Institute; Jim Brady, who is editor-in-chief of Digital First Media and president of the Online News Association; Rob Mennie of Gannett Broadcasting; Karen Dunlap, president of the Poynster Institute; and the host of the panel session, Bob Papper of Hofstra University.

I cannot begin to describe how insightful, interesting and exciting this discussion was. Not surprisingly, engagement was a theme that resonated throughout the session. What was interesting, however, was the idea of a return civic journalism and commitment to communities being regarded in very high standards by news outlets.

Without further ado, I present some highlights from these powerful speakers.

Tom Rosenstiel

  • Previously, consumers had to adapt their behaviours to accommodate the media (in terms of news at specific times, for example). Today, the news media need to adapt their cycle and behaviours to suit the audience.
  • We are in a period of democratization and a type of enlightenment, in this sense.
  • Audiences are consuming more news today, not less. 25% of people state they are consuming more news, while only 10% say they are consuming less. Among those who consume through mobile technologies, 32% say they are consuming more and only 8% consuming less.

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Change is Good

Published in Ottawa Magazine, May 2013 issue.

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How a terrible accident a decade ago turned software engineer and government worker Jith Paul into a key player in Ottawa’s film industry.
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Many filmmakers would say they started on their path the second they picked up a camera as a child.  Others realized if it the first time they watched a film that truly inspired them.  For Jith Paul, however, it was the injury to a vertebra in his back that launched his film career.  In 2002, Paul, who was working as a software engineer at the time, fell while working out at home, injuring his back.  In the aftermath, he worked with an occupational therapist to relearn how to walk.  But as he took care of his physical recovery, Paul’s mental focus was on how to follow his dream of working in the film industry.

Now, just over a decade later, the 41-year-old finds himself overseeing–he jokingly labels himself president, CEO and janitor–Treepot Media, one of Ottawa’s fastest-growing production companies.  But how does someone make such a drastic jump–from a secure job consulting with the government to a player in the notoriously unpredictable film industry?  ”Sometimes you need a catalyst to reorganize your priorities in life,” Paul says.  ”And after the back injury, I decided maybe film was something I wanted to try more than just as a whim.”

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Te’o, Thamel and Deadspin: How the Web Outreported the Traditional Media

With the unraveling of one of the strangest sports stories of recent memory still leaving much to be explained, in the wake of Deadspin breaking the story that Notre Dame Fighting Irish All-American linebacker Manti Te’o’s inspirational girlfriend was, in fact, fake, it strikes a few questions on how something like this could go on for so long.

The circus surrounding this issue started just yesterday when Deadspin, an online sports blog that is part of the Gawker Media family, revealed that Te’o’s girlfriend, who passed away of leukemia just six hours after his grandmother had also passed away, has no record of ever existing. Despite being a graduate of Stanford, having been in a serious car accident that hospitalized her, and having been admitted to a (unnamed) California hospital for months for leukemia treatment, and ultimately passing away, Deadspin journalists’ Timothy Burke and Jack Dickey found no paper trail for Lennay Kekua having done any of these things. Or even being an actual person.

Photo by Flickr user JamesChicago. Published under Creative Commons.

Photo by Flickr user JamesChicago. Published under Creative Commons license.

While there has certainly been swirling tidbits of gossip and speculation as to why such a hoax was pulled off, let’s leave that alone and look at how such a story proliferated through the mainstream media for so long.

Remember, this wasn’t just some hoax that didn’t carry any weight outside of the Notre Dame community. No, the death of Kekua garnered national media attention, especially after Te’o spoke of her making him promise to continue playing no matter what happened to her. That same narrative of Te’o overcoming great amounts of grief (some of it real, as a result of his grandmother’s passing, keep in mind) followed him throughout the entire season, on his way to seven major collegiate football awards, and a Heisman nomination. There is no denying Te’o was a skilled player, yet you must still question whether that emotional aspect played into the minds of voters.

So, again, how did such a story receive so much coverage without this information of Kekua’s non-existence coming to light earlier? There are a few significant problems in the reporting of the story that can be looked at here.

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