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Third-generation bronc rider Logan Hay charges out of the gate on Day 1 of Canadian Finals Rodeo

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Strong First Night for Logan Hay

Logan Hay got the monkey off his back on night one of the Canadian Finals Rodeo. The third-generation bronc rider marked an impressive 85.75 points on Vold Rodeo’s 52 Elvira to top the field in a performance that saw the competitors take on the eliminator pen.

“I’ve never got a score in the first round at CFR in the three years I’ve been here,” the Wildwood, Alberta cowboy said. “The first time was first year jitters, then some bad luck honestly the next two. This year I knew I had one of the harder horses in there; she’s not easy. You have to go all or nothing as she bucks off a lot of people. All the guys had their hands full tonight. There wasn’t an easy one in there. A lot of guys stubbed their toes who don’t normally do that. I got by a tough one and I’m glad it worked out.”

Tonight’s performance was a re-match for the young athlete as he earned top honours on the same horse at the Strathmore Stampede earlier in the season. “It’s always good to get the first one under your belt. It’s good for your confidence.” Hay added.

Among the casualties on the night was three time and reigning World and Canadian Champion Zeke Thurston who bucked off Calgary Stampede’s Cloudy Skies.

In the ladies barrel racing event it was 17 year old rookie, Blake Molle from Chauvin, Alberta who turned in the winning time – a 13.78 second run on her gelding Mercy. The tough roster of barrel racers enjoyed a strong first out with half the runs under 14 seconds.

The first performance steer wrestling lead was shared by three men: North Dakota cowboy Riley Reiss and Albertans Ryan Shuckburgh and Ty Miller, all in at a solid 3.9 seconds.

In the bareback riding, 2019 Canadian Champion Orin Larsen teamed with Duane Kesler Championship Rodeo’s Knockout for 86 points and the $9335 cheque. The round win moved the Inglis, Manitoba cowboy into the early lead overall.

On a night when the team ropers as a group struggled, the combination of Tee Mcleod and Brady Chappel – both Saskatchewan athletes – took the round win with a 4.3 second run. The victory was doubly productive for Mcleod who moved to the lead in the All Around race.

Tie down roping saw Wimborne, Alta. cowboy Jason Smith earn top money with an 8.3 second run on Moon, Canadian Tie-Down Horse of the Year.

And 2019 Canadian Champion bull rider Edgar Durazo was flawless in covering last year’s Bull of the Year, Duane Kesler’s Alberta Prime Devils Advocate. Durazo marked 89 points to move closer to season leader Coy Robbins who bucked off in the round.

In the novice bareback, season leader Chase Siemens won first with a 77.5 effort while defending novice Saddle Bronc Champion Colten Powell was 72.5 to win his event in the first performance.

Brodi Beasley was awarded 82.5 points to claim the junior steer riding win in performance one.

And 2006 Canadian Bull Riding Champion and youth rodeo coach Tanner Girletz was presented with the prestigious Cowboy of the Year award sponsored by Legend Rodeo. Congratulations Tanner!

Go to rodeocanada.com for Canadian Finals Rodeo results. Check out www.cfrreddeer.ca/ for additional event details.

CFR ’49 performance two kicks off at 6:00 pm Nov 2 at the Peavey Mart Centrium, Westerner Park in Red Deer, Alta. If you cannot attend the event, sign up to follow the action on The Cowboy Channel.

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Priming The NHL Coaching Carousel For Another Spin

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“The world will ask you who you are, and if you do not know, the world will tell you.” Carl Jung

We are about a month into the endless 2024-25 NHL schedule. There are good surprises. Winnipeg and Calgary are better than thought. There are bad surprises. Cup finalists in spring, Edmonton is 3-4-1. Vexing Toronto is at a mediocre 4-4-1.

It’s early. But not so early that several coaches are not feeling the heat already. We can expect that heads will soon roll if certain teams don’t find their mojo. It’s a sad but predictable result of a salary cap league where the most disposable item is a coach. As we wrote in May, don’t shed too many tears for the deposed coaches. Salvation is just a turn of the wheel away.

As long as you’re willing to re-locate frequently the job of NHL head coach has a fair degree of job security. Even when you get fired it seems there’s a ready appetite in some other town for a skill set you have just failed at.

Latest evidence that failure has an I and U in it: Having canned Sheldon Keefe after a lengthy (note: sarcasm) five years at the helm of the Toronto Maple Leafs, club management scoured the bushes to find former player Craig “Chief” Berube, who has previously hung his coaching shingle in Philadelphia and St. Louis, where he won a Stanley Cup as an interim coach.

Chief wasn’t the glamour name (we were praying for Bruce Boudreau.). If the idea is how do the Leafs motivate their four mega-millionaires, he’s more like Mike Babcock than Sheldon Keefe. He won’t look at players’ cell phones, but he will give them that old-time religion. Knowing Chief from his Calgary days we’d say he can probably take the Toronto fishbowl. 

(For those with long Leafs’ memories Berube was part of a famous trade in 1992 to which we devote an entire chapter in our new book Deal With It. He went west to Calgary while Doug Gilmour headed east to Toronto in the massive 10-man trade. While the Leafs “won” the trade, only the maligned Gary Leeman and journeyman Jamie Macoun won Cups– for teams other than Calgary and Toronto.)

But we digress. Sometimes it seems that NHL teams would rather lose with a known commodity than win with someone bold and unconventional behind the bench. While almost 30 percent of NHL players are European there have only been two European heads coaches, none in the past 20 years. Why? NHL owners are risk averse. And the league is a fraternity of forgiveness for guys you played junior with. 

A brief ramble through the 2023-24 coaching roster shows several peripatetic bench bosses, led by the inimitable John Tortorella, who wore out his welcome in Vancouver, Tampa Bay, NY Rangers and Columbus before Philly curiously decided he had something left to offer. Let’s also not  forget Lindy Ruff, who was pink slipped in Buffalo, Dallas, New Jersey and the NY Rangers— and now has been resurrected in Buffalo as a “fresh voice”. 

Some retreads are getting results. Peter Laviolette got the Rangers into the third-round of the 2024 postseason, after gigs in Carolina, Philadelphia, Nashville, Washington (pause for breath) and the NY Islanders. Paul Maurice, who guided Florida to the Cup, has had two  stints with Carolina, plus Toronto and Winnipeg. Peter DeBoer, whose Dallas Stars were odd-on faves to with the 2024 Cup, has also coached Florida, San Jose, New Jersey and Vegas. 

You want more? Rick Tocchet was head coach in Arizona and Tampa Bay before getting the perch in Vancouver. Travis Green, newly hired in Ottawa, has previously been found wanting in Vancouver and New Jersey. We could go on.

The king of the coach-for-life carousel is the just-retired Rick Bowness who finally called it a day in Winnipeg after the Jets were eliminated this spring. How long has Bones been knocking around? He was the coach of the expansion Ottawa Senators in 1992, one the worst five teams ever by NHL standards. Wonderful man who also spent stints as an assistant in cities in 30-plus years around the continent. 

There are more. Sitting in the green room, polishing their pregame speeches are the well- travelled Boudreau, Dallas Eakins, Gerard Gallant, Todd McLellan, Claude Julien and Mike Yeo. Heaven forbid someone might still ask one of the Sutters to saddle up again. Brian (St. Louis, Chicago, Boston, Calgary), Darryl (Calgary, L.A., Anaheim, San Jose and Calgary again) and Brent (Calgary, New Jersey) have been perennial NHL coaching prospects for decades.

So take, heart, Sheldon Keefe. Joining Keefe in looking for a rebound job are Scott Arniel, Jeff Blashill, Jeremy Colliton, Kevin Dineen, Phil Housley, Kirk Muller, Davis Payne, Todd Reirden, Joe Sacco, Brad Shaw, Geoff Ward and Trent Yawney. Good company. [UPDATE: Sheldon didn’t have to wait long. The NJ Devils signed him as their new coach.]

Don’t cry too hard for these coaching candidates. Unless they have years left on contract (Keefe had two) most wait out the time between head-coaching stints by accepting assistant-coach positions. The ranks of assistants contain a second tier of talent, also ready to go at a moment’s notice. 

There are a scant few who’ve hung on in one town. Jon Cooper has been in Tampa since 2013, a Methuselah stint in today’s terms. Rod Brind’Amour has managed to avoid the chop in Carolina since 2018. But the reality is that, since the start off the 2023-24 season alone, there have been 13 head-coaching changes in the NHL. Go back to January of 2023, and 19 of the league’s 32 teams have changed coaches.

Which brings us back to the original idea: “Is there no one in international hockey who knows anything?” We won’t profess to be coaching talent scouts, but the idea that no one working outside North America can meet the job description better than some— if not most—of the coaches mentioned above beggars the imagination. 

One final note: If you’re looking for an explanation of the coaching carousel and its recent frequency, look no further than Gary Bettman and his salary cap obsession. By forcing a hard cap on teams he’s concentrated the money— and the power— on a few players per team. When a coach is pitted against his stars it’s a no-win proposition. 

The Leafs stars used their power to get Babcock fired. And it’s been repeated on other teams. While Keefe didn’t lose his Core Four he also couldn’t get them to win in the postseason. For that he got the chop— and a premium place in the next coaching carousel.

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster  A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada’s top television sports broadcaster, he’s a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. His new book Deal With It: The Trades That Stunned The NHL And Changed hockey is now available on Amazon. Inexact Science: The Six Most Compelling Draft Years In NHL History, his previous book with his son Evan, was voted the seventh-best professional hockey book of all time by bookauthority.org . His 2004 book Money Players was voted sixth best on the same list, and is available via brucedowbigginbooks.ca.

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Hundreds of women golfers call on LPGA to ban ‘transgender’ male player, protect women’s sports

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From LifeSiteNews

By Doug Mainwaring

275 female golfers are demanding that the LPGA and other governing bodies of golf revoke policies that allow men to compete in women’s golf events and protect female golfers’ right to compete only against ‘members of the female sex.’

Hundreds of women golfers have signed a letter calling for a “transgender” player – a male claiming to be a female – to be removed from Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) competitions.   

The August 19 letter, signed by 275 female golfers expressing their concerns over a gender-confused male competing in women’s golf to the LPGA, was also sent to the United States Golf Association (USGA) and the International Golf Federation (IGF).  

While self-professed “transgender” golfer “Hailey” Davidson comports with the LPGA’s current pro-transgender qualifying guidelines, hundreds of women in the LPGA’s ranks have stepped forward to object to him competing in their professional sport.

The letter makes two demands of the LPGA and the other governing organizations in the world of professional golf: “Repeal all policies and rules that allow male golfers to participate in women’s golf events” and “establish and enforce the right of female professional golfers to participate in women’s golf based on sex-eligibilty [which] must be limited to members of the female sex.” 

Lauren Miller, who has competed against Davidson and is leading the charge against males competing in her sport, spoke out in a recent interview with OutKick’s Dan Dakich.  

“There is no world where I ever thought this would be the case,” Miller told Dakich. “I’ve been talking to my parents about it, and they can’t believe they have a daughter who is having to go through this. It’s truly shocking to realize kind of where we are today and that this is the state of the world.”  

Miller said in another interview published by Independent Women’s Forum, Davidson “would hit the ball 10 or 20 yards past me, and sometimes 50 to 60 yards past me.” She added that “distance is one advantage… but there’s a lot more to it than that.”  

She also noted there was also the question of “superior upper body strength,” which can give “greater clubhead speed, and allows the ball to come out higher and with more spin,” according to a Newsweek report.  

“We all know there can be no equal athletic opportunity for women without a separate female golf category. Yet, the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) continues to propagate a policy that allows male athletes to qualify, compete and win in women’s golf, even as several national and international governing bodies of sport and state legislatures increasingly reject these unjust and inequitable policies that harm female athletes,” states the letter, reviewed by OutKick 

LPGA policy does not explicitly state eligibility based on sex. It is essential for the integrity and fairness of women’s golf to have a clear and consistent participation policy in place based on a player’s immutable sex.  There are differences between the sexes—female and male—that specifically affect our sport of golf. 

The male advantage in driving the ball is estimated around a 30% performance advantage; this is an enormous difference in the context of sport. Anatomical differences between males and females affect clubhead speed and regulating consistency at ball contact.  

Females have higher mean heart rates and encounter greater physiological demands while playing, especially at high altitudes. The anatomical differences are not removed with male testosterone suppression. There is no way to turn a male into a female. Being female is not equated to being male with a reduction in strength. 

“Someone needs to do an investigation into the LPGA — and all other sports organizations that are allowing men to play women’s sports,” Family Research Council’s Mary Szoch told The Washington Stand 

“They must be receiving massive amounts of funds from somewhere,” Szoch added. “Why else would a sports organization [repeatedly] destroy fair play and jeopardize the safety of women?”  

“We cannot give up the fight for women’s sports,” said Szoch because, “doing so would be giving up on truth — something that our society cannot function without.” 

The LPGA needs to “immediately change their policy. Second place to a man isn’t good enough for women in sports,” insisted Szoch.  

Davidson, who was born in Scotland but now lives in Florida, played college golf on the men’s team at Virginia’s Christopher Newport University.  

In 2015, he began hormone drugs and had transgender surgery in 2021, a requirement to compete under the LPGA’s gender policy, according to Golfweek. 

“We have to protect young girls and their opportunities and their dreams,” said Miller.  

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