‘UFEr “SUN

fPANTHER.

'By John Cairns

Vernon Pahl has been a lineman for UPEl's Football Panthers for the past 4 'years. On February 20th - he was chosen by the IWinnipeg Blue Bombers in ithe third round of the lCanadian Football League's Amateur Draft. 4

Vernon, a philosophy\' jmajor, has been a consistent alltstar in the Atlantic Football Conference, and twiCe he has been part of the region's_all~conference team:*~He-does have one ‘

ear of eligibility left (for college play, but Ed Hilton of the UPEI Athletic Department doubts that Vernon will utilize that time if he can make the professiOnals. '

Vernon admits that he expected to be drafted. what he didn't anticipate, however, was being chosen ‘ as early as the third “

VOLUM EFF" 7‘

MAKE

L _ ‘”That came as a real shock.

I was actually chosen ahead of some guys who were all-Canadians." '

, In early June Vernon will be packing his bags and departing for training -camp. He doesn't know exactly where the camp will be yet, but as he puts it,

“It will be somewhere in, ~the«damkw deep regions of

round making him approximately ManltOba.”

the twentieth player . selected. 'In his own words,

5' Winnipeg, to Vernon: is as good a place to play as

CHAMPIONS «AT UPEI

By John O'Brien

' UPEl's Brent Cutcliffe and Alex Smith won the» Atlantic Universities

,badminton doubles title at Acadia, last weekend. Their strongest competit- ion came from the Acadia team, which pushed the score as high as'lB—lS before the'UPFl pair was able to dispose of them. Things were relatively quiet for the rest of the 'Weekend, which was part of Acadia's March break; no other doubles team was. ' able to score more than I0 points against the Strong UPEl team. . , Eutcliffe and Smith ‘_ Were entered in the doubles Category only, since all' Participants were limited to one category of play. «in the tournament. ,They had to play eight matches after St. Vincent Univeri usity,dropped out of'the7 rOund-robin tournament. ‘ Although UPEI went Undefeated in all eight games in men's doubles, Dalhousie University of Nova Scotia wen-the

overall men's title,,

-while UNB took the Over-

all women's title.

“We knew we had a good chance,” said Alex Smith, but he added that he was eSpecially happy in win- ning afterithe difficult- ies involved in training at UPEl. “For the amount of people that play,” said Smith, UPEI made a pretty good showing. One of the biggest obstacles the UPEI" representatives had to

Vovercome was the problem

of training. Practice sessions are reduced tO‘a mere two hours every Suni

day and, then, the control room at the gymnasium is

rusually abandoned so no

one is available to supply, the nets and other parat phernalia that make the game easier to play. The reason why UPEI had a viable team to represent the University at the tournament is that one of the players happens to own his own equip- ment, which the team relies on for practices. When asked his opinion of the proposal to eliminate

ISSUE'TB

3'9 WE.

Panther star Vernon Pah

’any.

Indeed, he's relieved to join the“Blue Bombers,

zone of the”weaker CFL squads.

With_a more powerful team he feels his chances of

.excelling would be reduced.

One of Vernon's immediate . problems is that he has to change playing positions.

He readily admits that he

is too small to be a CFL

llineman;' instead,he will 'have to try for a spot as

an outside linebacker, and this may be difficult to

such activities as badmin- ton tournaments on campus, Alex Smith summed it

_ UN -

KARCHlVES U. P. E. l.

16'\‘PAGES,

PAHL To BOMBERS

do. He says he will have to play a more controlled game as opposed to being a lineman when he used unleashed emotion to

,penetrate the opposition.

For a man about to launch a possible career in professional sport, Vernon is remaining remarkably calm. He feels that when l he was younger the prospect of entering the CFL might have been a dream come true. In the light of

‘reality, however, all the

dreamlike qualities fade. He knows he faces a challenge,

I

and he is preparing to meet it.

Vernon isn't sure he will be wearing a Blue Bomber uniform in the upcoming season., He declares that if he is it will be a miracle, but perhaps he is too modest. In any case, people at UPEI wish him the best, and hope soon for the opportunity to see him perform on television.

even a little more interesfl in the sport, would be most beneficial to the

all up with: “ 'sounds scary”, development of the sport

He would like to see at least one more two-hour practice session held each week and, although he didn't complain, it was' apparent that a less sloppy approach to practice at UPEI, and .

UPEI student John O'Brien ‘is among lZO volunteers chosen from across Canada by Canadian Crossroads international (CC!) to live and work with‘local people on urban and rural self-help projects in developing countries.

CCl's l980 contingent /

of French and English Speaking Canadians will depart in May and September for their placements in “Asia, Africa, South America, and the Caribbean.

Mr. O'Brien will be visiting the Caribbean.

r SUN.

at UPEI.

For more comment on . the proposal to change a number of sports activities at UPEI, see this week's Perhaps your favorite activity is one of those concerned.

U'FEI STUDENT CARIBBEAN BOUND

John O'Brien I