Ameen Aghamirian, Men’s Wrestling
This weekend, the McMaster wrestling team attended the Ontario University Athletics Wrestling Championships and, for the fourth year in a row, the men took home silver overall. Aghamirian’s dominance on the mats earned him national recognition, as he was U Sports Male Athlete of the Week.
Congratulations to Ameen Aghamirian, our U SPORTS Male Athlete of the Week! 🤼♂️
Félicitations à Ameen Aghamirian, l'athlète de la semaine masculin de U SPORTS! 🤼♂️
🔗 EN: https://t.co/lK7hWCGOAs // 🔗 FR: https://t.co/neIdzK39lW pic.twitter.com/CFkke2MPeV
— U SPORTS (@USPORTSca) February 6, 2019
Aghamirian helped his team by winning gold in the 82 kg weight class. He defeated the Lakehead University Voyageurs’ Brody Evans and the York University Lions’ Jasman Gill due to technical superiority, and beat the University of Guelph Gryphons’ Simon Chaves 6-1.
This victory took him to the divisional final where he defeated the Western University Mustangs’ Brandon Amboto by tiebreaker after a 5-5 match due to a higher number of takedowns. His efforts from the weekend led him to be named McMaster’s Pita Pit Athlete of the Week. Next up, Aghamirian and the Marauders prepare for the U Sports championships on Feb. 22-23.
Stinellis made Marauders history after taking home the OUA Rookie of the Year earlier this season. The Pita Pit Athlete of the Week is the first female wrestler to win the award since it began in 2008. Stinellis took the 48kg weight class by storm, pinning all three of her opponents: Voyageurs’ Megan Smith, Lions’ Gurleen Tak and former medalist, Western’s Christine Grafe. In the finals, she, unfortunately, was pinned by the Gryphons’ vet Natassya Lu, and walked away with a silver medal. Her efforts helped the Marauders place fifth overall and secured her spot at the U Sports Wrestling Championships.
This weekend, the men’s volleyball team’s victory had two co-stars leading it. The duo helped lead the Marauders to a 3-1 defeat over the University of Waterloo Warriors on the road. Both Richards and Passalent finished the game with 16 kills, with Richards adding four aces and one block assist to the stat sheet, and Passalet adding two aces and two total blocks. The defeat bumped the men up to fourth place nationally, improving to a 10-2 OUA regular season record. Up next, the team will host the Nipissing University Lakers and the Lions for their final home matches of the regular season. The Saturday, Feb. 9, will be a special Pride celebration, followed by a showdown with York the next day.
Gates was once again an on-the-court leader this weekend in Mac’s 65-41 defeat over the Western Mustangs. With a game-high 19 points and 8 rebounds, putting her just two shy of a double-double. The 2018 OUA Rookie of the Year has been performing extremely well this season and is on track to being named an OUA all-star. The victory helped the team move up to third place in the U Sports national rankings, and first place in the OUA West, clinching a playoff berth. Gates and the Marauders will head to Algoma University this weekend to take on the Thunderbirds.
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By: Coby Zucker
The swimming season is a short one punctuated by smaller meets, split in half by the Divisional Championships and capped off with the climactic Ontario University Athletics Championships. For the team, the OUAs give the opportunity to show the improvements made across the season, and encourage their teammates in an event packed with some of the best swimmers from across Ontario.
“We’re very excited about the OUAs,” said head coach Grey Fairley. “This is always the most fun meet of the year. The passion and the excitement that all teams exhibit but especially, obviously, our team, it's just so infectious. We're all exhausted at the end of it, but it's like we've taken ourselves to a higher plane of existence.”
Hannah Dvorski, now in her fifth and final year of eligibility on the team, will be looking to add to her collection of hardware in the 50m, 100m and 200m backstroke, and on the three team-relays.
“I think physically, we're all there right now,” said Dvorski. “We're just getting into the right mental headspace and just believing in ourselves. I think, as we get closer, we're going to start to feel what we refer to as the ‘OUA magic’. So I'm excited for that to take place and I know we're all really really excited.”
Dvorski is looking to improve on her bronze finishes in the 50m and 100m at the Divisional Championships, and put forward a performance that will help the women’s team climb the standings.
On the men’s side, third-year Simeon “Mony” Tchervenelekov is coming off a dominant performance over Waterloo University in a recent dual meet at McMaster. Tchervenelekov is looking to notch his first podium OUA finish in the intermediate medley, breaststroke or team relay categories.
Chosen as one of the team’s captains for the season, Tchervenelekov has the added responsibility of looking out for the rest of the team and helping them get into mental form for the OUAs.
“I know a couple of the guys who got sick this past week,” said Tchervenelekov. “And you know they're getting worried about their performance. That's kind of where [Mitchell Muizelaar], the other captain, and myself, on the men's team at least, stepped in and kind of give them a little boost of morale.”
Emotional and mental readiness, as well as generally getting into the right headspace, is a pivotal part of the OUA preparation. As practice eases up and distances decrease in favour of shorter sprints, the shift in focus moves from the physical side and starts to emphasize capturing the championship mentality.
“I feel like the team a couple of weeks out of OUAs, we're all physically there,” said Tchervenelekov. “And then about like a week out, it starts to hit us and we get a little bit nervous. But that's good because OUAs is coming up and you know it's the meet of the year and everyone gets a little nervous, and that's how you know that we're ready.”
For Dvorski, the emotional frenzy of the OUAs is underscored by a degree of sentimentality as she participates for her final time.
“It's special to wear the Marauder on your cap and to represent McMaster on the blocks,” Dvorski said. “I think I've done it well for the past five years, and I'm excited for what the future holds for me.”
Although the University of Toronto Varsity Blues have swept the OUAs for the past five years, the Mac women were able to score a bronze medal finish two years running, and are looking to keep the streak going. Their male counterparts will also have their sights firmly set on a return to the podium. This year’s OUA Championships, hosted by Brock University, runs from Feb. 7-9.
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Championship season is looming and McMaster continues to come up in trophy conversations. February marks the end of the regular season and brings us the (arguably too long) playoffs or championship meets for a variety of Marauder teams. 2014-15 could be one of Mac’s most successful years. Here’s what to watch for going forward.
Head coach Tim Louks has his team peaking at the right time once again. Mac has ripped off two comeback wins in recent weeks and clinched first place the OUA West division. With that finish, they will host the OUA Final Four as long as they win in the quarterfinals. That being said, Mac was swept in their three losses this year and they’ll likely meet one of the teams that beat them during championship weekend. The positive: those games happened on Nov. 23 or earlier, meaning McMaster has had time to improve.
Player to watch: Joanna Jedrzejewska
McMaster hasn’t seen a more dominant program on campus since the 2012 football team. They dropped their first game against Western but haven’t looked back since then, only losing two sets in 16 games. Head coach Dave Preston has his group leading nearly every team statistical category. Mac has consistently qualified for the CIS Final 8, but they have been unable to capture a national championship, winning bronze and silver in 2014 and 2013, respectively. This Marauder team is firing on all cylinders and the other CIS contenders have looked shaky. Nothing is guaranteed, but McMaster could be home to a national champion come March.
Player to watch: Danny Demyaneko
The Marauders track team are past the mid-way point of the season and are on a roll heading into the Boston Invitational on Feb. 13. While three athletes were selected to compete at the Boston University Valentine Invitational, the rest of the team will be competing at the CAN AM Invitational in Windsor.
Blair Morgan, Chelsea Mackinnon and Jeff Tweedle have been given the opportunity to compete at the fast track in Boston University.
Players to watch: Chelsea Mackinnon/Jeff Tweedle
Mac pulled off an incredible comeback against the Toronto Varsity Blues on Feb. 1, but they didn’t come out completely unscathed. Hilary Hanaka, an OUA Rookie of the Year candidate, suffered a foot injury and only played 20 minutes. According to the coaching staff, she will be available for the final regular season stretch. While Hanaka avoided major injury, the team lost another key contributor. Linnaea Harper broke her foot against Guelph and is finished for the year, and meanwhile Isabel Ormond and Jelena Mamic were unable to suit up at all because of injuries suffered in the off-season. Theresa Burns’s group will still qualify for playoffs, but they will have to rely on their depth and alter their play style a bit if they want to make their way back to nationals for the first time since 2010.
Player to watch: Clare Kenney
The sky is the limit for Mac and this deep roster, but they haven’t been able to put it all together yet for 40 minutes. The team came close to doing that against Toronto, putting together a 49-24 first half against the Varsity Blues. The Marauders wavered in the second and U of T actually won the half. The OUA is as deep as it has ever been, with Windsor, Ryerson, Ottawa and Carleton all in the top five of the CIS top ten. Head coach Amos Connolly’s group has a soft schedule going forward, but they need to iron out the wrinkles and play a complete game before any Mac fan buys a CIS Final 8 ticket package.
Player to watch: Aaron Redpath
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When the Marauders beat the Guelph Gryphons 20-15 on Nov. 15, they did more than win a trophy or earn a berth in the Mitchell Bowl. They solidified the McMaster football program’s place in history.
With the Yates Cup win, McMaster can rightfully say that they are the most consistent program of the new millennium. Since 2000, Mac has won seven Yates Cups in eight championship game appearances — three more than Western, the next closest program.
The team is undefeated in Yates Cup finals under head coach Stefan Ptaszek and has won three championships in the last four years. Achieving “dynasty” status in sports is incredibly difficult, yet here we are. And of all the squads to win a Yates, this one may have had the toughest road.
The team came into the season as relatively unknown given a less-than-stellar campaign the year before. Winning the OUA was a goal, not an expectation like in previous years, and that showed in the celebra- tion. The post-game scene was emotional chaos.
Players yelling, screaming about the win, finding family and loved ones to embrace and running toward the stage — it was an outpour of feelings. No one really had a direction; players darted between runs to the stage and the people calling their names.
As someone who has witnessed Yates Cup wins by the Marauders before, it was interesting to see the confusion. This group has a handful of players who have won the Yates before, and they still have players who won the 2011 Vanier Cup, too. But you couldn’t tell that anyone had been there before, because in a way, they never have.
Recent Marauder generations had dominated the competition, running through Yates Cup opponents with little regard for who lined up on the opposite side of the ball. Now though, the league talent has caught up and the Marauders were not as balanced.
This game encapsulated all of that. Mac’s passing game was non-existent: Marshall Ferguson (one of the 2011 Vanier Cup winners) completed 24-34 passing for only 191 yards, throwing three interceptions in the process.
The ground game was effective, but running back Chris Pezzetta could not get every first down. He tried, though. Pezzetta, who tore his ACL twice in the past two years, rumbled for 144 yards. Guelph, while under-manned due to injuries to Jazz Lindsey and A’Dre Fraser, put together good drives and stymied Mac’s attack. The only Maroon touchdown of the game came from defensive lineman Mike Kashak, picking off a James Roberts screen pass, stiff-arming the Guelph QB and running for 30 yards to put six on the board.
It was the defence that brought the Yates back to McMaster. Joey Cupido picked off the Gryphons twice in the game — once in Mac’s endzone — and has 14 interceptions in 14 career playoff games. The CIS does not know who the all-time leader in post-season interceptions is, but let’s just give it to Cupido.
It was a performance so good, there is little risk of time stretching the truth and exaggerating just how well Cupido played. A crucial break-up in the fourth quarter solidified his spot as the Yates Cup MVP.
As the players ran around in post-win delirium, it seems like they were running with a bit more freedom. There has been nothing convincing about this season and most of the games against real competition have been ugly affairs.
The season, up until now, left something to be desired because we had experienced the best teams in school history.
But all the talk about being a team that can make a run at the Vanier was validated when that Yates Cup was hoisted.
This new brand of football delivered a Yates and really, that is all that matters. This team is playing with house money, escaping the toughest conference in the country and looking like they still have another gear. The rest of the CIS is wide open too. Laval lost to Montreal in a 12-9 kicker’s duel. Mac’s opponent Mt. Allison made it through a transitioning AUS conference, playing few, if any, games against national contenders.
“It’s okay to be proud. It’s not okay to be satisfied,” said Ptaszek after the game. And watching that group celebrate while taking the group photo, banner and trophy in the centre of the team, you saw the pride. You didn’t see satisfaction. You talk to the players, and you hear that pride but you don’t hear satisfaction.
Players like Pezzetta, Ferguson, Cupido — you could see that they do not want to be a checkpoint on the 2014 Vanier Cup bracket.
They want to be there at the very end.
