By Jon Roe
The Dinos celebrated a year of three national championships and numerous external awards with their own annual awards night Tuesday at the Red and White Club. The Canadian Interuniversity Sport national championship-winning Dinos swim team swept the women’s side of the major awards, taking both the Dr. Dennis Kadatz award for athlete of the year and the Bill Popplewell award for rookie of the year, while the Vanier Cup finalist football team swept the men’s side, with both the athlete and the rookie of the year winners.
Second-year swimmer Erica Morningstar was the female Kadatz winner. She helped the Dinos to their second straight national championship by picking up 200 of the Dinos 679 points in Toronto.
“It’s really exciting,” said Morningstar. “Our swim team is awesome. . . . CIS was our goal and to have the team there cheering for you elevates the intensity that you have to compete at.”
Morningstar has yet to lose a race at the CIS meet, winning 14 gold medals so far in her two years of CIS competition.
She beat out teammate Katy Murdoch, sprinter Amonn Nelson, wrestler Gen Haley and field hockey player Carolina Romeo.
Two-time Hec Crighton winner Erik Glavic was named the top male athlete.
In his first season since transferring from St. Mary’s, Glavic led the Dinos the Vanier Cup, where they lost to the Queen’s University Golden Gaels. With him behind centre, the Dinos broke or tied a pile of offensive records while leading the nation in total offence.
“Given the other guys who were up for this award, to win is amazing and I’m so grateful and appreciative,” said Glavic.
He beat out basketball forward Ross Bekkering, swimmer Jason Block, sprinter Sam Effah and volleyball middle Oleg Podporin to become the first quarterback to take the Kadatz home since Dinos offensive coordinator Greg Vavra in 1984.
Allison Long, who was named the rookie of the meet at the national swim meet, won the Bill Popplewell award as Dinos rookie of the year. Basketball player Tamara Jarrett and volleyball player Maura Hayes were also nominated.
Linden Gaydosh, who was the Peter Gorman award winner as the top rookie in CIS football, beat out swimmer Bogdan Knezevic and basketball point guard Jarred Ogungbemi-Jackson for the Dinos male rookie of the year award.
The most anticipated award of the evening was presented in the middle of the night, strangely. Each year the Gauntlet honours two athletes who have persevered through adversity and shown dedication to the Dinos with the Extra Effort Award. The male winner was volleyball player Graham Vigrass, who had to sit out 10 weeks in the middle of the season to recover from mononucleosis. He came back and helped lead the Dinos men’s volleyball team to the CIS championship and was named the MVP of the tournament.
The female winner was hockey player Sinead Tracy. She broke her collarbone twice and was only able to dress for eight games. However, she continued to inspire her teammates and earn the respect of her coaches by being the hardest working team member in the weight room and when she got her icetime.
The awards were presented by Jon Roe Sports Editor, who despite being unable to stare directly at the camera was still able to muster weird-looking half smiles. Roe also retained his devilishly handsome looks in spite of a tie that should have probably been retired back in 1976.