Signed, sealed and Division 1 delivered
South Delta’s McDonald off to Maine, while Victoria’s Bull joining ex-Lions coach at Fresno State
Jeff Tedford, the former B.C. Lions head coach who helped raise the Titanic at Cal, is in charge of another college football salvage operation at Fresno State, his alma mater and the place where his coaching career began.
Taking over a 1-11 Bulldogs team that was more dog than bull last season, Tedford has reached out to B.C. to recruit a mountain of a young man in Dontae Bull, a 6-foot7, 305-pound offensive lineman who played for Victoria’s Belmont high school Bulldogs and now gets to suit up for an NCAA Division I team of the same name.
“No, I didn’t choose Fresno State because they’re called the Bulldogs,” Bull said in a phone interview Wednesday. “It’s nice. Something of an add-on. I had a few options, but I felt at home and at ease at Fresno. He (Tedford) was a big part of the decision. He’s a really good coach. He’s sent lots of guys to the NFL. He’s lived up here (in B.C.) and coached and played in Canada. That’s another nice part about it.”
National Signing Day has become part of mainstream American sport, a ritual that overlaps into Canada. By tradition, the first Wednesday in February is the day when high school football recruits sign letters of intent, binding them to NCAA universities in return for an athletic scholarship.
Bull’s was the first of two signed letters from B.C. to squeak through a fax machine down south Wednesday. After an 11th-hour bid by another school to get him to commit elsewhere, running back/linebacker Grant McDonald of the South Delta Sun Devils returned to his first choice and confirmed he’s going to the University of Maine.
McDonald, who dominated the top tier of B.C. high school football in 2015 both as a linebacker and running back, missed four games in his senior year with a badly sprained ankle. That didn’t stop Maine, North Dakota, Buffalo and a host of CIS schools from reaching out to the 6-foot-4, 225-pound prospect. He turned down the UBC Thunderbirds — his dad Bruce was a member of the Thunderbirds’ 1986 Vanier Cup champion team — and Calgary, where his older brother Jack is a receiver for the Dinos, to commit to the Black Bears.
Orono, Maine, is 5,500 kilometres from his high school in the Vancouver suburb of Tsawwassen, but McDonald said he grew up watching U.S. college football on Saturdays. The lure of playing Division I football “is definitely something I’ve always wanted to do.”
And he believes he could get to play right away.
“The (Maine) coaches didn’t mention anything about being redshirted in my freshman year,” McDonald says. “They’re going to try me out at halfback. Even if I’m not starting, I’ll be the next man up. If nothing else, I’ll be playing special teams.”
“He has the ability to be a factor early on in his career,” agrees Maine head coach Joe Harasymiak, who has three Canadians in his 2017 recruiting class, including an offensive lineman from Ottawa and a defensive back from Montreal in addition to McDonald. “He’s extremely physical — and you need to be at this level.”
Bull is part of Tedford’s ambitious rebuild at Fresno State, a turnaround situation he has faced before. In 2002, he took over the Cal Golden Bears, who were coming off their worst season (1-10) in more than a century. By his third season at the University of California, Berkeley, Teddy’s Bears were ranked among the top 10 teams in the U.S.
That about-face didn’t work for him as expeditiously at the pro level.
In 2015, taking over the CFL team from fired head coach Mike Benevides, Tedford directed the Lions to a 7-12 record — including a desultory loss to Calgary in the West Division semifinal — B.C.’s worst season since 1996. Tedford resigned at the conclusion of the season.
He spent last year as an offensive consultant — a sounding board — for head coach Chris Petersen with the University of Washington Huskies before Fresno State hired him in October. Two months later, Tedford reached out to the CFL to hire Orlondo Steinauer away from the Hamilton Tiger-Cats as his defensive co-ordinator.
Fresno State has made some bold scheduling moves in 2017 — the Bulldogs play the Alabama Crimson Tide and the Huskies in backto-back weekends in September on the road. The thought of playing the big boys in Seattle and Tuscaloosa, where college football is a religion, leaves the Belmont high school senior trembling in anticipation.
“We get to play the best of the best,” Bull says. “That’s what I want. I definitely want to see how far football can take me while I’m having my education paid for. Getting a degree is still a priority.”
A prospective teacher, he’ll balance his studies with another form of higher learning in Tedford’s outdoor lab.