U Sports (stylized as U SPORTS) is the national
sport governing body
A sports governing body is a sports organization that has a regulatory or sanctioning function.
Sports governing bodies come in various forms and have a variety of regulatory functions. Examples of this can include disciplinary action for rule i ...
of university sport in Canada, comprising the majority of degree-granting universities in the country. Its equivalent body for organized sports at
colleges in Canada is the
Canadian Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA). Some institutions are members of both bodies for different sports.
Its name until October 20, 2016, was Canadian Interuniversity Sport (CIS; french: Sport interuniversitaire canadien, SIC, links=no).
On that date, the organization rebranded as "U Sports" in both
official languages.
The original Canadian Interuniversity Athletic Union (CIAU) Central was founded in 1906 and existed until 1955, composed only of universities from
Ontario and
Quebec. With the collapse of the CIAU Central in the mid-1950s, calls for a new, national governing body for university sport accelerated. Once the
Royal Military College of Canada became a degree granting institution, Major W. J. (Danny) McLeod, athletic director at the RMC directed the establishment of the Canadian Intercollegiate Athletic Union (CIAU) in 1961. Major McLeod ran the CIAU from his office at RMC as the first CIAU Secretary-Treasurer. In the 1960s the CIAU functioned as a voluntary, autonomous, educational sport organization which represented by the various universities from coast to coast. In 1978, the Canadian Women's Interuniversity Athletic Union (CWIAU), which had formed in 1970, merged with the CIAU; the expanded CIAU reinforced its university focus by adjusting its name to the Canadian Interuniversity Athletics Union. It changed its name to Canadian Interuniversity Sport (CIS) in June 2001 due to growing misconceptions about the name of the organization since the term "athletics" was associated with track and field and "union" with labour movements.
According to the organization, the name change to "U Sports" came about in part due to a desire for a brand that was "instantly recognizable and identical in both French and English."
[ The rebrand was accompanied by a new approach to presentation of Canadian University sports, its teams, and its players. The new, singular logo and name came with a new website to better present stories taking place throughout the athletics programs U Sports governs, bolstered by a new approach to social media.
]
Sanctioned sports
Source:
* Basketball
* Cross country
* Curling
* Field hockey (women's only)
* Football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...
(men's only)
* Ice hockey
* Rugby union (women's only)
* Soccer
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...
* Swimming
* Track and field
* Volleyball
* Wrestling
2016 rebrand
On October 20, 2016, CIS announced that it would be changing its name to U Sports, accompanied by a new logo and approach to Canadian University sports. The name was chosen in part to better represent Canada as a bilingual nation with a united name as opposed to separate acronyms. The new name and look are also intended to increase the marketability of Canadian University sports.
Signifying a major shift in the presentation of Canadian University sports, U Sports aims to better engage with Canadian sports fans and present the athletes it governs. To do so, U Sports aims to promote the stories of its key athletes through a new approach to social media as well as a new website in order to "create a massive change in the way Canadians see university sports in the digital era".
Athletic funding
The U Sports member institutions offer athletic scholarships known as Athletic Financial Awards (AFA); subject to minimum academic requirements. The AFA's are capped and may not exceed the value of the tuition and compulsory fees for the student-athlete. Universities also may provide additional non-athletic awards including academic scholarships and needs-based grants for athletes in addition to this cap, provided the additional awards do not include athletic criteria. In 2008/2009 one in two U Sports athletes was receiving an athletic scholarship.
Increasingly, U Sports schools are offering booster-support programs, where alumni, parents and/or corporations can donate money to a targeted fund especially designed to off-set a student-athlete's tuition and living costs. The University of Windsor has an ''Adopt-A-Lancer'' program, for example. U Sports has no regulations regarding how much each school can provide to teams through private support. The Université Laval's Rouge et Or football team, winner of seven of the last 12 Vanier Cups, is so successful with fund raising that the team trains in Florida during the spring.
Canadian Hockey League
The Canadian Hockey League (CHL; french: Ligue canadienne de hockey ‒ LCH) is an umbrella organization that represents the three Canada-based major junior ice hockey leagues. The CHL was founded in 1975 as the Canadian Major Junior Hockey L ...
teams offer financial support for their graduates – who attend school within two years of playing major junior – who choose to play for a U Sports school after graduating from major junior hockey based on a model where the league will give scholarships commensurate with the seasons they played in the CHL.
Hockey players who play in the CHL are ineligible for NCAA athletic scholarships, although many attend a CHL training camp: however, they can only stay a maximum of 48 hours, and can not dress in any games.
Championships
Source:
Members
There are 56 member universities in U Sports. These 56 member universities are currently organized into the four following regional associations. In some of these sports, these associations are sometimes referred to as ''conferences''.
* Atlantic University Sport (AUS)
*Canada West Universities Athletic Association
Canada West is a regional membership association for universities in Western Canada which assists in co-ordinating competition between their university level athletic programs and providing contact information, schedules, results, and releases abo ...
(CW)
* Ontario University Athletics (OUA)
*Réseau du sport étudiant du Québec
The Réseau du sport étudiant du Québec (RSEQ; literal translation: ''Quebec Student Sports Network'') is the current name for the organisation formerly known as the Fédération du sport scolaire du Québec (FSSQ; ''Quebec Student Sports Federa ...
(RSEQ)
;Notes
Basketball
As of the 2019–2020 U Sports season, 48 of the 56 member institutions have both men's and women's basketball teams. In sports with heavy university participation, like basketball, some of the conferences have had divisions. The OUA previously had four divisions from 2014–15 to 2016–17, but reduced them back to two for the 2017–18 season. With the addition of Ontario Tech for the 2019–20 season, OUA moved to three six-team divisions. Canada West had two divisions, but reverted to a one conference format for the 2016–17 season with 17 teams. The AUS conference has eight teams while the RSEQ conference has five.
The U Sports men's and women's basketball teams are organized in the following way:
Football
27 of the 56 member schools participated in the 2019 U Sports football season
The 2019 U Sports football season began on August 23, 2019 with the Concordia Stingers hosting the Montreal Carabins in Montreal, Quebec. The Atlantic University Sport conference started play the following day and the Ontario University Athletics ...
. As of the 2017–18 academic year, the two U Sports members in Sherbrooke compete in separate leagues in football only. Bishop's football moved from RSEQ to AUS, and Sherbrooke remains in RSEQ football.
Men's ice hockey
35 of the 56 member schools participated in the 2019–20 Men's Ice Hockey season.
Women's ice hockey
34 of the 56 member schools participated in the 2019–20 Women's Ice Hockey season. The Bishop's Gaiters will join the RSEQ and start play in 2020–21 and the Trinity Western Spartans
The Trinity Western Spartans are the athletic teams that represent Trinity Western University in Langley, British Columbia. The university's teams are members of U Sports, and compete in the Canada West Universities Athletics Association, and ...
and MacEwan Griffins will join Canada West.
Men's soccer
48 of the 56 member schools participated in the 2019 Men's soccer season.
Women's soccer
53 of the 56 member schools participated in the 2019 Women's soccer season.
Men's volleyball
30 of the 56 member schools participated in the 2019–20 Men's volleyball season. After Memorial disbanded their team following the 2016–17 season, two teams competed in the AUS with three competing in the RSEQ, before Dalhousie and UNB moved to the RSEQ with the AUS dropping men's volleyball as a varsity sport.
Women's volleyball
39 of the 56 member schools participated in the 2019–20 Women's volleyball season. Six teams compete in the AUS and six in the RSEQ. Another 14 compete in the OUA, split between an East and a West division, and the Canada West conference has 13 women's volleyball teams.
See also
* National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the American equivalent of U Sports.
* List of colleges in Canada
This is a list of colleges in Canada. Colleges are distinct from universities in Canada as they are typically not degree-granting institutions, though some may be enabled by provincial legislation to grant degrees using joint programs with univer ...
* List of universities in Canada
* Athletics Canada
* Canada Basketball
* College basketball
* Canadian Soccer Association
* College soccer
* Football Canada
* College football
College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States.
Unlike most ...
* Hockey Canada
Hockey Canada (which merged with the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association in 1994) is the national governing body of ice hockey and ice sledge hockey in Canada. It is a member of the International Ice Hockey Federation and controls the majority ...
* College hockey
* Royal Canadian Golf Association
* Canadian Collegiate Athletic Association
* International University Sports Federation
* Universiade
Notes and references
*
External links
*
{{U Sports volleyball
1906 establishments in Canada
College and university associations and consortia in Canada
Sports governing bodies in Canada
College sports governing bodies in Canada
Sports organizations established in 1906
Student sports governing bodies
