Alan Alderson was ready to hand uniforms to Nicolas Favia, Dilly Ohuegbe and Taylor Cooper. All three players had stated their intentions to play for the UNBC Timberwolves men's soccer team -- which, under Alderson's guidance -- is a second-year entry in the Canada West Universities Athletic Association.
But, much to his disappointment, Alderson later found out all had changed their minds.
The reason? UNBC wasn't the right fit for them academically.
For university-level athletes, a popular area of study is kinesiology and UNBC doesn't offer it.
For those not in the know, kinesiology is the study of anatomy, physiology and the mechanics of body movement. Getting a background in kinesiology (sometimes with additional study) can lead to careers in personal training, coaching, teaching, recreation programming and sport administration. Of course, one can also become a practicing kinesiologist.
Favia and Ohuegbe are skilled offensive players and Cooper is a promising defender. All were projected to become valuable members of a UNBC men's soccer program that is trying to find its feet in Canada West, part of the larger entity known as Canadian Interuniversity Sport.
Alderson was hired at UNBC in May of 2012 and, to date, has done a bang-up job when it comes to recruiting out-of-town talent. Last year, he snared the sublime Sourosh Amani, a Dutch citizen who had been living, playing and sniping goals in Victoria. This year, Alderson has brought in -- among others -- Calgary products Tofa Fakunle and Jake Vickers, a pair of attacking midfielders who are considered among Alberta's elite in their age group. But the coach really wanted Favia, Ohuegbe and Cooper as well.
In past years, the UNBC athletics program has lost out on multiple potential recruits because of the lack of a kinesiology program. Loralyn Murdoch, the long-time women's basketball coach who was named the school's new athletics director at the end of May, vouches for that fact. Murdoch said she learned early on in the recruiting game to tell student-athletes right up front that kinesiology wasn't an option at UNBC.
"We can offer them other things, like health sciences, but if that didn't interest them, I didn't keep going down that road," she said.
The fix here seems to be simple -- introduce kinesiology at UNBC.
But Murdoch, who has a kinesiology degree herself, said the school tries to offer programs that lead students on direct paths to jobs and she's not sure if kinesiology fits that bill.
"I don't know in this day and age the feasibility of having kinesiology because I just don't know if there's the jobs available," she said. "UNBC takes a lot of pride in offering programs that are employable and I don't know we can say that 90 per cent of our students are going to get jobs in the field of kinesiology."
Food for thought -- a great many other institutions of higher education around the province evidently see value in kinesiology.
Right here in Prince George, the College of New Caledonia approved a two-year kinesiology diploma program last year and it begins this fall. Other schools in B.C. that have certificate, diploma, degree or university-transfer programs in kinesiology/human kinetics include: College of the Rockies (Cranbrook); Capilano University (North Vancouver); Langara College (Vancouver); Okanagan College (Penticton, Vernon, Salmon Arm); Douglas College (New Westminster); Simon Fraser University (Burnaby); Thompson Rivers University (Kamloops); Trinity Western University (Langley); UBC Okanagan (Kelowna); UBC (Vancouver); University of the Fraser Valley (Abbotsford); University of Victoria; and Vancouver Island University (Nanaimo).
So will UNBC join the kinesiology fold? Probably not in the near future, according to Murdoch.
"[We have to determine] if kinesiology and [the] education [program] do go hand-in-hand or if we want to look at kinesiology to go into a physiotherapy route as a post-degree," she said. "That's something that the university may down the road look at if there is a high need for that program for bringing in students but I don't think it's on the radar any time soon."
In the meantime, Alderson and the Timberwolves will get on with the business of soccer. The UNBC men will play their first exhibition game today in Ottawa against the Ottawa Fury youth team and, while back east, will also take on McGill University, the University of Montreal, Guelph University and Carleton University. The T-wolves have home exhibition games against Thompson Rivers University scheduled for Aug. 30-31 and will commence their 14-game regular season Sept. 6 at North Cariboo Fields against the University of Saskatchewan.
Even with three of his prized recruits absent, Alderson is expecting his team to take a big leap forward from its inaugural Canada West campaign, when it posted a record of 1-13.
"Our goal is to make some dramatic improvements in the standings this year," Alderson said. "We only have to finish above two [of the other four] Pacific Division teams to make it into playoffs and so we're certainly hoping to do everything we can to make it across that particular hurdle. Once you make it into playoffs anything can happen and in order to [qualify] we figure we need to win at least seven games. We're hoping that our home field and our home fans give us that little bit that can help us close the gap from last year and turn some close games into some wins for us."
