I was an Eastwood Rebel for fifteen years - five as a student-athlete and ten as a teacher-coach.

 

So to sit down and write a column reflecting on 50 years of Cameron Heights athletics is like asking one of the Starks to pen a summary of their relationship with the Lannisters. (Sorry - I have Game of Thrones on the brain right now.)

 

To say the least, it's complicated. And for many reasons.

 

I had friends who were Golden Gaels. I went to parties with Golden Gaels. I worked summers at J.M. Schneiders with Golden Gaels.

 

Our Eastwood crowd even hung at the Pinery with many of the Cameron crew on long weekends. Together, we got tossed out of there by the "smokies" - as we called the provincial park authorities back then.

 

But it wasn't all Labatt's Blue and Led Zeppelin.

 

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In the seventies, our football rivalry was intense.

 

I remember missing a Friday field trip to Stratford to see a Billy Shakespeare production because the beating I took as a quarterback the night before at Seagram Stadium from my Cameron Heights "friends" made it difficult to breathe, let alone cough or sneeze.

 

The x-rays of my ribs showed nothing was broken, only bruised. Similar to my ego after losing a hard-fought close game.

 

I mean, these guys were tough with a capital "T".

 

And why wouldn't they be? They were coached by a tough guy - Ron Bell.

 

I faced Coach Bell as a player and later as an opposing coach many times and one thing you always knew about his CHCI football teams - they would be tough.

 

Tough physically. Tough mentally. Tough to beat.

 

Tough. Tough. Tough.

 

And just to be clear, I'm not talking about only the football guys or only back in the day.

Pick a sport - basketball, football, volleyball, soccer, badminton, wrestling, whatever. It doesn't matter.

 

For a half-century now, any coach or player in any sport will tell you that whether you're facing a single Golden Gael or a legion of them, they will be prepared, they will be competitive as hell, and they will not quit.

 

Have I mentioned that they're tough?

 

The Golden Gaels I've played against, coached against and nowadays referee on the basketball court, would rather eat glass than give in. They won't always win but they'll make damn sure you bring your "A" game if you want to take a "W" away from them.

 

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Oh, you want proof? No problem.

 

Why don't we start with a former heavyweight champion of the world?

 

That tough enough for ya?

 

In the late winter of 1983, I was a student-teacher sitting on the Eastwood bench with my former coach, Joe Martino, watching the Gaels warm up at the other end of the Forest Heights gym (neutral site) while Lennox Lewis ran in lay-ups prior to a WCSSAA finals tip-off.

 

Boxing was already his go-to sport but I had watched him on both the football field and the basketball court a number of times and he wasn't just tough - he was good. He could play.

 

And yet, he came off the bench because that team (which went on to capture AAA OFSAA a few weeks later) was loaded with so much talent even someone as athletically gifted as Lewis wasn't able to crack the starting line-up…but talk about a sixth man!

 

Also on that team was its bona fide star, David Kipfer, who went on to play Division One ball at Providence for then-coach Rick Pitino. He was a starter when the Friars made it to the Final Four.

 

I remember Joe turning to me after Kipfer made yet another powerful post move and scored yet another ridiculously easy bucket and saying "That guy is a man among boys."

 

Along with Lewis, that made two men among boys. And that's without mentioning Rob Froese (also a superb baseball player for the Kitchener Panthers) or any of the Naus brothers.*

(* - Frank, Marcel and Jasper all played but don't ask me with whom or when - I just know they were all very good.)

 

That team was coached by the late Court Heinbuch who, in my way of thinking, was the Ron Bell of basketball coaches. Or was it vice-versa?

 

Both men were fiercely competitive, immensely talented, thoroughly loved and respected and…(wait for it)…tough.

 

Two of the toughest Gaels I ever came across were running backs on their football team albeit from two different eras. One I played against and one I coached against.

 

Later in the same season that I got manhandled under those stadium lights, we met up with Cameron in the senior football semi-finals on their home field. A game that went into double overtime and darkness.

 

And while I was once again taking a beating - mostly at the hands of all-star defensive end Andy "The Mountain" Teminski (another GoT reference) , we had some pretty tough Rebels of our own laying it on them pretty hard. The target of most of our punishment was halfback Pat Rigg who, pound for pound, is the toughest athlete (in any sport) I've ever played against.

 

I don't know how many shots Rigg took that day - and it was a long day - but every time we thought "he'll never get up from that hit" or "well, he's definitely done now", out he'd come to start a new possession, as resilient as ever.

 

I've seen a lot of tough kids play high school football over the years but the only guy I've seen with a toughness similar to Rigg was another Golden Gael named (you guessed it)…Tyler Varga.

 

Varga, who went on to star at UWO and Yale before briefly playing for the Indianapolis Colts was a junior player when I was coaching at SJAM and first laid eyes on him.

 

We had a very good team and all I remember from that game on our field was saying to whoever would listen things like "Who is this guy and why can't we tackle him?" and "Who is this guy and why won't he ever go down?" and "Who is this guy and when will he stop punishing our defensive players?"

 

Rigg & Varga are the Lennox Lewis & Dave Kipfer of Golden Gaels football.

 

And Lewis & Kipfer are the Ron Bell & Court Heinbuch of Golden Gael athletics.

 

A little confused? Trying watching the first few seasons of The Thrones…but I digress.

 

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Hey, look - trying to cover fifty years of athletic excellence at CHCI is next to impossible. It requires a book, not a column.

 

I could do a piece on Cameron Heights football kickers alone: Bernie Ruoff (Syracuse, CFL all-star), Mike Karpow (Syracuse, CFL & pro soccer) and Ronnie Pfeffer (WLU, CFL).

 

But with all my playing and coaching experiences landing on the male side of things, I have a lot fewer observations related to female sports at Cameron.

 

I remember a friend of mine, Chris Bryant (Murray), playing on some very good basketball teams. I remember Tammy Boug (Ho-Shing) being a dominant force at several track meets (Gary Crossley ran a dynamite track and field program for many years). And I know that the 1999 Sr. girls volleyball team was the first female team from the school to qualify for OFSAA competition.

 

I never saw them compete but I know that badminton star Robbyn Hermitage won gold at the Pan American Games and that Tia MacDonald captured OFSAA gold in wrestling.

 

I also know there's been some excellent leadership from female PE department heads such as Lois Fox and Sandy Fallis.

 

I also know that two of my former colleagues in the Eastwood phys. ed. department (can you say ironic?) were outstanding athletes for the Gaels: Cecily Kowalik (Steeb) and Sylvia Malgadey-Forgrave.

 

In fact, Malgadey-Forgrave was an Olympian in 1984 Los Angeles (made it to the semi-finals in hurdles) and is a member of  both the University of Waterloo Hall of Fame and the Waterloo Region Hall of Fame.

 

More important, both Cecily and Sylvia, two women I'm proud to call friends, would be first ballot inductees to the All-Caring, All-Quality Human Being HOF if someone ever starts one.

 

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I want to conclude by first acknowledging all the wonderful athletes, coaches, timers/scorers/managers, administrators, support staff, etc. who played such an integral part in making the Golden Gaels athletics program into what it became.  Whether your role was large or small, you are to be commended for contributing to 50 years of excellence.

 

And I apologize for not being able to mention everyone worth mentioning - obviously an impossible task.

 

Because for every Roy Dahl, Gary Boug, Mark Seupersaud and Andrew Scharschmidt I mention, I'll miss an Evan Martin, Steve Ostapchuk, Aaron Wilson or Jayne Carmichael.

 

Not to mention the two Brian's (Henry and Irving), the two Tim's (Bridge and Weber), the other Bell (Kevin) and a host of other current teacher-coaches.  I'm looking at you Johnny Forte, Chuck Thompson, Frank Leung and Nazim Ramzan.

 

Okay - somebody stop me!

 

At this point, you're probably thinking that I'll finish with a reference tying Cameron Heights athletics into the Iron Throne. Or maybe King's Landing (such as it is).

 

Instead, I'll paraphrase Robert Frost, via Johnny Cade, from The Outsiders speaking to his friend Pony Boy:

 

"Stay gold, Cameron Heights."

 

It's what you've always been.