By Mitchell Fox
Making the long skate across the ice, players on the Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) Bold and Mount Royal University (MRU) Cougars traded the bright lights and big screens of the rink for the shadowy red tunnels of Ottawa’s TD Place on March 20.
As yet another intermission ensued, players on both teams hurried to make use of any support their team staff could offer. Some went straight to the athletic therapist for work on aching and cramping limbs. Others ate and drank what they could for fuel. They all remained locked into the game.
Long before it made history as the longest-ever U Sports men’s hockey game, the first quarterfinal game of the 2025 U Sports University Cup (U Cup) men’s hockey championship would be the last of a long season for the losing side.
Over the course of three regulation and five overtime periods—and over seven hours from opening puck drop to final buzzer—the Bold and Cougars fought tooth and nail, knowing it had to end in opportunity for one and heartbreak for the other.
Eventually, the Bold came out victorious. First-year forward Spencer Shugrue scored after 143 minutes and 33 seconds, ending the game and surpassing the previous record for the longest U Sports men’s hockey game by about 26 minutes. His stick was sent to the Hockey Hall of Fame to commemorate the record.
“I can’t imagine how the players are feeling right now, because, to be honest, I was sore standing,” said Bold head coach Johnny Duco after the game. “It just makes me that much more proud of this group, to know that they fight through adversity. They stick together through thick and thin.”
Duco, in his eighth season as head coach of the Bold, was impressed with how his team pushed through the game, especially after going down 3-1 in the second period.
“There’s never a doubt, nothing but the utmost belief in that group, in us, that they’re going to find a way to get it done,” he said. “Huge kudos to them to find a way.”
“They only have to show up and play hockey. They’re not worrying about anything else”
Kevin MacDonald is the operations and social media manager for the TMU Bold men’s hockey team and served as an assistant equipment manager during the tournament. He said he doesn’t usually get “worked up” about games but a feeling of relief stood out to him at the end of this one.
Each game day, while players prepare for a battle on the ice, Kevin and the staff set the team up for success behind the scenes. On this day, he and the Bold’s varsity equipment manager Kevin Campbell arrived at the rink at 7 a.m. to ensure all of the team’s equipment, snacks and other provisions were ready to go.
“It’s a long day, especially behind the scenes, for the sports staff,” he said following the final buzzer. “The [players] don’t see what we do behind the scenes but they understand what we do.”
The Bold arrived in Ottawa on March 18 and skated the next day, getting used to the soft ice, square corners and rattling boards that TD Place is known for. For Kevin and sport performance manager and strength and conditioning coach Ryan MacDonald, their first days in Ottawa were about finding places for all of the team’s needs.
“At the [Mattamy Athletic Centre (MAC)], everything has its own place, and everything has labels or cupboards or whatever. Now it’s like, ‘OK, we’re gonna put this here to make it easier for the guys,’” said Kevin. “They only have to show up and play hockey. They’re not worrying about anything else, because when they’re at home, they don’t worry about anything else.”
Throughout a game, no matter its length, everyone on the Bold dives into their roles. But during an eight-period game, the need to keep players in good form is heightened. The crew did everything they could to bring snacks, electrolytes, water bottles and stretching equipment to the players in between periods.
“We’re taking extra care of the guys, because yeah, you play four periods, maybe the odd time five…but eight is a whole different beast,” said Kevin.
As the game continued past second-year Bold forward Daniil Grigorev’s game-tying goal—over 90 minutes of game time before Shugrue’s winner—Duco said the Bold coaches focused on keeping their message to players short between periods.
“You try to stay even keel and probably minimize the things you’re talking about, knowing that they’re exhausted. If you overdo it, it’s going to be in one ear out the other,” said Duco.
Many of the Bold’s key players played in a similar situation at the 2024 U Cup at the MAC, where they beat the Calgary Dinos in double overtime of the quarterfinals. The team’s veterans also went to the U Cup in Halifax in 2022, so Duco said he knew they were used to the big stage.
“It was pretty awesome to hear and see when you’d go into the room before I would speak, listening to what they were talking about,” he said. “We’re so fortunate to have tremendous leadership and to have some super hungry players that wanted to get back to this stage.”
At the other end of the ice, the Cougars represented a small program with big goals. They got to the Canada West final for the first time in program history this year, and entering as the fifth seed, they were determined to make waves at the U Cup.
“We’re the little hockey program that could,” said Cougars head coach Bert Gilling post-game, who led MRU to their first-ever playoff win in his first season in 2014. “We thought we had as good a chance as anybody to win Canada West and the national championship. So to be one and done, it’s a little hard to swallow.”
In the dressing room, Gilling said he heard “all of the right things” from his players. Like Duco and his staff, the Cougars’ coaches said what they needed to say but let the players keep themselves in high spirits and focus.
“They’re breaking up with some laughter every once in a while…I mean, good grief it’s what, seven hours? What are you gonna do? You can’t be serious the whole time,” he said. “The buy-in in this group in terms of what we’re trying to do, and the culture of our program, it really showed itself in those moments.”
“Yeah, you play four periods, maybe the odd time five…but eight is a whole different beast”
During every intermission at the MAC, Kevin can be seen rushing between the Bold dressing room and bench, emptying and refilling water bottles. During this unprecedented game in Ottawa, the team had to devote one of two large jugs for electrolytes to water and he had to refill the jugs three times, something they wouldn’t usually do.
Ryan was just as busy. He ordered pizzas for the players and made multiple trips across Lansdowne Park—the plaza surrounding TD Place—to the grocery store, stocking up on granola bars and water. He also brought cold coffee, flat Coke and compression massage devices for the players’ legs.
“He was dialed in. Ice bath, Normatecs, food, snacks, treats, whatever they needed,” said Duco about Ryan. “You name it, we had it in there to make sure that we had every competitive advantage possible.”
Duco said the team leaned on having “all the bells and whistles,” including equipment, supplies and snacks available to replicate a home game. A favourite for the players—often seen in small cups outside the Bold change room at the MAC—is stroopwafels, which third-year goaltender Kai Edmonds said he ate between periods. Hailing from the Ottawa area, playing in the 11th longest game in North American hockey history at home was special for him.
“It’s a game that happens probably once in a lifetime, right? Five overtimes is pretty crazy,” said Edmonds post-game.
Down the hallway, the Cougars’ staff were going through a similar scramble to keep players in the best shape possible. Gilling said it was “all hands on deck” as their strength coach, trainers and MRU associate director of varsity athletics Rod Godfrey got to work. Godfrey was the one running across Landsdowne for the Cougars, ordering food and snacks while the coaching staff sought all the advice they could in such an unprecedented situation.
“We were texting and trying to call our dietitian back in Calgary, like, ‘What should we be doing right now? We’re running out of ideas,’” said Gilling. “We [hardly talked] as coaches to the players between periods. It’s just like, ‘What do we need? How can we get you guys back out there?’ Everybody was awesome to get through a night like that.”
“We’re the little hockey program that could”
If the game’s length wasn’t enough, a zamboni malfunction led to a delay between the first and second overtimes. As TD Place staff scrambled to spray the ice with fire extinguishers, fans and media members circled the rink, searching for food anywhere other than the then-closed concession stands—which opened up again before the day’s second game was supposed to start. All the while, the two teams tried to maintain their usual flow.
“Twice, we were about to walk out and then had to go back in,” said Edmonds of the delay, which added 15 minutes to an already 18-minute long intermission. “[You] just gotta be ready. There’s nothing that you can do to get back out there faster.”
As overtimes rolled by, neither team could create much of an advantage on the ice. The Cougars appeared to end the game early in the third overtime period but a video review confirmed the puck never crossed the goal line. After the false ending, the players settled back into a back-and-forth rally.
Around the start of the fourth overtime, fans began to pile into the building for the evening game that would follow between the host Ottawa Gee-Gees and the two-time defending champion University of New Brunswick Reds.
Edmonds said he saw the building getting busier, but tried to keep his focus on stopping pucks and trusting his team to score the winner.
“Maybe sometimes a little frustration sneaks in, wanting the boys to finish it, but I just have to worry about what I’m gonna do,” he said.
The Bold staff knew they had all the equipment they needed to get through any game, while the players stuck to their usual routines—no matter which intermission it was.
“Hockey players and most athletes are superstitious by nature,” said Kevin. “We have a routine where a couple of the guys say stuff to the players just before they walk out, and that stays the same, whether it’s the first period, fourth period, or, in this case, eighth period.”
He said the Bold are a “well-oiled machine.”
“By the eighth period that we played, it was literally just ‘OK, let’s do it again.’”
While Shugrue’s goal closed out the longest men’s hockey game in U Sports history, it didn’t put an end to the drama. The Cougars called for a video review of the goal, which saw Shugrue poke a puck through third-year goaltender Shane Farkas’ pad in a scuffle in the crease.
At the end of likely the longest day of his tenure with the Bold, Kevin admitted he was tired. Fans are used to an overtime or two, he said, but this game was closer to watching a movie marathon.
“It’s still the waiting and sitting around and standing there, it’s the same for everybody. The athletes just kind of took a bit more of a beating than anybody in the stands did.”
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