Cyril Butler has returned to the sidelines and he’s loving it.
“Great to be back on the football field this year,” enthused the St. Peter Catholic High School Knights’ junior boys’ defensive co-ordinator and defensive backs coach. “I really missed it.
“We wondered if junior was done for Ottawa. This fall has been a real gift to us and to the kids.”
The last time Ottawa high school athletes in Grades 9 and 10 experienced junior football was in 2011. That was football in the fall, with a real regular season, playoffs and a championship final, which was won by the Knights.
But in the past three years, the juniors had to settle for a low-key spring league or no football at all. Even with the return of junior football this fall, it’s not sanctioned by the National Capital Secondary School Athletic Association, the governing body for high school sports in Ottawa.
The league only has six teams and the NCSSAA constitution requires eight for an official league. The senior football league has 14 schools, which are divided into the OFSAA league of four teams, trying to qualify for a provincial bowl game, and a Tier 1 division of 10 teams.
The NCSSAA also doesn’t permit a student-athlete to play the same sport at the junior and senior level at the same time of the year. Some of the six junior football teams have had a player(s) compete for their school’s senior team this fall.
But ‘real league’ or not, Butler is thrilled to be back coaching high school football for the first time in four years. The junior league consists of six schools — St. Joseph, Ashbury, Sacred Heart, St. Mark, Sir Wilfrid Laurier and St. Peter. All have senior teams, except Sacred Heart.
Along with his family and 22-year teaching career, coaching young athletes has been one of the pillars of Butler’s life. And he’s not just a one sport coach. Whether it’s in high school or the community, he has served as a coach, technical instructor or strength/power/speed co-ordinator in hockey, soccer, rugby, basketball, track and field and football for well over 1,000 games.
His coaching philosophy is direct. It’s all about making sure the young athletes learn the skills, are challenged to be the best they can be and have fun.
Butler also has been on coaching staffs that have won championships — seven NCSSAA junior football titles (four at St. Mark, three at St. Peter) and two NCSSAA girls’ varsity hockey titles at St. Peter as well as seven divisional soccer titles with the Cumberland Cobras Soccer Club.
When asked if he knew his record of wins and losses during his extensive career, he was typically blunt: “No idea. Don’t care.”
Butler, 56, was introduced to coaching at St. Pius X High School by teachers Father Bob Bedard and Father Paul Baxter, who were legendary in their day.
“I was exposed to good coaching growing up. My first experience was with Father Bedard. He was a student of the game (basketball), calm, and in control. Father Baxter was a great (football) coach . . . passionate and had a love of the game.”
Although Butler admitted he wasn’t a great basketball player, Bedard invited the then second-year Carleton University student in 1980 to be his shadow coach and learn that aspect of the game. Bedard knew Butler enjoyed working with young people and thought he would be a good coach.
He has more than done that earning the respect of many parents for his ethics, perspective, balance and understanding of the importance of developing character.
“Parents get confused,” he said. “They think we teach players to win. But if you’ve done your best and you lose, well you lose. It doesn’t define who you are,” he said recently during an interview in his classroom.
“I don’t scream at the kids. Coaching is teaching. It’s an extension of what I do every day. I love my kids and the atmosphere of learning.”
Butler coaches between seven and nine sports in a calendar year. It’s all about time management and having an understanding wife, Heather Lawson, a former notable basketball player at Brookfield High School and an elementary school principal today.
“I like the kids I coach. I like sports. It’s a nice mesh. When I retire, I will not stop (coaching),” said Butler, who once had six different sports practices to attend as a coach in three nearby locations one school day three years ago.
“I have fun. I love coaching kids because they get excited and passionate. But when the fun is gone, the kids are gone, too. It must be fun. But you must challenge in a positive way and not motivate through fear. The kids will not put up with it.”
Richard Sennott, the former executive director of the Ottawa District Hockey Association, conducted many clinics in his day and Butler was one of his students. Here’s one of the lessons he has carried with him.
“The coach can take this much credit (for team success),” Butler said, spreading his thumb and index finger about an inch apart. “If you win, it’s because of the athletes. If you lose, it’s the coach. I’ve adopted that to stay humble. There’s a lot of truth to it.”
Martin Cleary’s High Achievers column appears bi-weekly. If you know an athlete, coach, team or builder you consider a high achiever, contact Martin at martincleary51@gmail.com.
CAPITAL SPORTS HUB
• Ottawa’s Patrice Dagenais is on top of the world. As co-captain of the Canadian wheelchair rugby team, he helped undefeated Canada to five straight wins, including a 54-50 victory over the United States in the final of the BT world wheelchair rugby challenge in London, England. By winning the gold, Canada is ranked No. 1 in the world for the first time in 13 years. Dagenais also was on Canada’s gold-medal team last August at the Parapan American Games in Toronto.
• As the Rachel Homan rink prepares for the six-day Masters of Curling beginning Tuesday, the Ottawa rink does so as the No. 1 ranked women’s team on the World Curling Tour. Homan has won three of her four competitions this season, including the Stockholm Ladies Cup, and tops the money list with $42,254. Their latest win was the Curlers Corner Autumn Gold Curling Classic in Calgary, where Homan defeated Chelsea Carey of Winnipeg 9-3 (five ends). The Homan rink also leads the Order of Merit ranking list and has a 26-4 win-loss match record.
• Howard Darwin lost his mother at age six and as a youngster growing up in a rough part of Ottawa took jobs shinning shoes and selling newspapers. But Darwin survived those humble beginnings to become a successful businessman, a legendary sports entrepreneur and is enshrined in the Ottawa Sports Hall of Fame. The full story about Howard’s remarkable life is captured in the book The Ten Count, which is written by his son, Jeff, and will be released in November.
• Scientist Kevin Willis is one of the best triathletes in the National Capital. And he’s 55 years old. He proved it at the recent world ironman championships in Kona, Hawaii, by placing fifth out of 116 competitors in his men’s 55-59 age group and finishing with the best overall result, 613rd, of the six Ottawa entries. There were 2,367 starters. Willis, who will compete in the world ultraman championships Nov. 27-29 in Hawaii, completed the 3.86-kilometre swim, 180.25-kilometre cycle and 42.195-kilometre marathon run in 10 hours, 27 minutes, 29 seconds. Nicolas Courville, 32, was more than 28 minutes ahead of Willis after the cycle, but slowed in the marathon and placed 670th in 10:32:56. Robyn Hardage was 12th out of 78 competitors in the women’s 30-34 age class as well as 833rd overall and the 78th woman in 10:48:26. Also finishing were Nicole Mikhael, 1,331st overall, the 255th woman, 11:53:20; Len Ireland, 1,389th, 19th out of 66 in men’s 60-64, 12:00:21; and Kayla Jones, 1,458th, 11th out of 31 in women’s 18-24, 12:12:02.
• Canada thoroughly dominated the world dragon boat championships in Welland, winning 56 gold medals on the 66-race, standard-boat division schedule. Fifteen national team paddlers from four Ottawa clubs (Ottawa Dragon Boat Club, Cascades Canoe Club, Bytown Dragon Boat Club and Outer Harbour Dragon Boat Club) were in the thick of it, sharing in 23 gold- and one silver-medal celebrations. The well decorated National Capital athletes from the 200-, 500-, 1,000- and 2,000-metre races were: Emilie Lariviere, Krysta Matthews and Christine Johnston, all four gold, premier women; Caroline Proulx, Connie Hart, Holly Allen Lennox and Michelle Lavoie, all four gold, senior A women; Ellen Pazdzior, Dawn Walsh, Beirong Xiong and Jackie Biron, all four gold, senior B women; Pazdzior and Walsh, all four gold, senior B mixed; Oliver Phfeiff, Kevin Banks and Bruce Raymond, all four gold, senior B open; Amanda Woodley, four gold, U24 mixed. Raymond also was the national team premier women’s assistant coach.
• The Ottawa Sports Awards Dinner is accepting nominations for individuals and teams who have had success in 2015 at the provincial, national or international levels as well as candidates for lifetime achievement awards in coaching, officiating and volunteer or administration. Nominations can be made at www.ottawasportsawards.ca. The 63rd dinner is Jan. 27 at Algonquin College. . . . Danielle Lalonde-Clarkin of Ottawa will be one of four on-ice officials at the 2016 world ringette championships Dec. 27 to Jan. 4 in Helsinki. . . . The Ontario Winter Games will not be held in 2016. The Ontario Sport Alliance, the backbone of the Games, has shut it doors as it didn’t have its multi-million dollar budget renewed by the provincial government. . . . Shona McCulloch, a Grade 11 student at Longfields-Davidson Heights Secondary School, won the varsity girls’ AAA three-mile race at the 51st McQuaid invitational cross-country running championships in Rochester, New York, winning in 16 minutes, 36.1 seconds for a four-tenths of a second victory. Mei Mei Weston of Glebe was second in the varsity girls’ AA race. Glebe, which also had a sixth-place result from Keili Shepherd, finished second in the team competition. . . . Defending champion Julia Malone of Ashbury College tied for seventh place with a 78 at the 18-hole OFSAA high school girls’ golf festival at the Roseland Golf and Curling Club in Windsor. At the OFSAA boys’ golf championship on the Kingsville Golf and Country Club in Windsor, Griffin Jones of South Carleton tied for 15th after a seven-over-par 76-75-151.