In the fastest growing current version of flag football, the one that will be unveiled to the world at the 2028 Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles, there are but five positions per team on the field.
That said, it was wonderful “positioning”, of sorts, that had Laurentian Voyageurs women’s flag football head coach Brett Walter so excited about the recent winter / spring season his team contested – as well as the outlook for his squad, moving forward.
“We put ourselves in a really great position to improve upon that ninth place finish,” Walter stated recently. “That ninth place finish” to which he alludes was the fall season run under the auspices of the Ontario Women’s Football Intercollegiate Association (OWIFA), the segment that is effectively the first half of a full campaign that sees teams like L.U. compete in two distinctly different pathways, albeit with the same 15 to 18 player roster.
The indoor winter schedule is one that pits Laurentian in a grouping that includes an adult component as Football Ontario, Football Canada and the Detroit Lions collaborate to grow interest in the female population base in a sport they all know and love.
Though the early tournament of Part II of the 2025-2026 season allows the post-secondary teams to match-up against older, more experienced opponents, the 2026 Intercollegiate Flag Football Championship that took place earlier this month at Fleming College in Peterborough was limited to a 20-team field of strictly college and university entries.
Having graduated an impressive core of talent last June, the Voyageurs followed up their 9th place finish in the fall with a very specific mindset for the tournament play that ensued in the new year in Oshawa and London.
“A big part of the thinking in entering two teams in the tournament was just to get everyone more playing time,” said Walter. “We’re young, so people just need to get out on the field. Development was priority number one.”
Development occurred.
Bolstered by the veteran presence of quarterback Addison Elliott and defensive captain Katie Miglioranza, both of whom will graduate this summer, the Voyageurs rode the progress of an exciting core of freshman talent that rose to the challenge of battling more university tested adversaries.
Twins Ava and Mya Massimiliano, Swiss army knife talent Tara Guse, ever improving Kaylee Vaillancourt and up and comer Maddyn St Amour also garnered praise from coach Walter after his team posted a 2-1 record in pool play, defeating Ottawa and McMaster and losing to the eventual gold medal winning Queen’s Gaels, following up with a dramatic overtime loss to Western University, a unit stacked with veterans, in the round of eight.
“We were playing such good football that it honestly feels like we earned one of the top three spots,” noted Walter, his team falling just short of reaching the top-three bracket that will advance to the Canadian playdowns in Regina (Saskatchewan) in May.
“Even though it was a bit of a heart-breaking way to finish the season, I think everybody felt very, very good about how well we did in pool play and how much we pushed Western,” he added. “It feels like we have some momentum going in the off-season.”
It wasn’t even just the current roster that benefitted from the game plan enacted by Walter, in concert with the remaining L.U. brain thrust of Véronique St Jean, Jeff Ruff and club president Lance Patrie. In order to create split squads, Laurentian welcomed aboard a small handful of local high-school talent, athletes they would dearly love to bring aboard in 2026-2027.
“We ignored the results at tournaments and developed young athletes,” said Walter. “Dedicating time and energy to the younger players paid dividends at provincials, especially when combined with a 5th year QB (Addison Elliott) who has a lot of poise.”
“We gave the young players the leash to make mistakes in January and February.”
For as much as the skills of speed and agility and the engrained drive needed to thrive in a more constrained and more aggressive setting can be spotted, at times, as the girls compete within the SDSSAA ranks, there remains a huge unknown when one moves away from the full 110 yard field that the girls are used to in the pre-university encounters.
“It’s not at all realistic for us to see someone in high-school and immediately say: she fits perfectly into this spot on the field,” stated Walter. Because they are playing 7 v 7 on a full field, it just doesn’t translate in an equitable way. That’s been a learning process for us too.”
The end of the season also brought about a little hardware for a handful of the Voyageurs, including coach Véronique St Jean (2025 OWIFA Rapaport Coach of the Year), Sydney Coe (first team all-star) and Addison Elliott and Kelly Clark (second team all-stars).
Rounding out the 2025-2026 Laurentian roster are Brooke Campeau, Chloe Rinaldi, Jade Marriott, Jocelyn Amon, Maija Potvin, Mya Farmer, Rebekah Poxleitner and Zoe Rienguette, a tremendous base as the team looks to 26-27.
“If we can teach the game up quickly to the newer players, I think we have a chance to better our performance next year,” said Walter.
