For the tenth straight season, the UBC Thunderbirds will play for Canada West supremacy, and for the third consecutive year they'll have to go through the Mount Royal Cougars as the two powerhouses battle for the 2025 conference banner on Saturday, November 1 in Calgary.
It's a fitting final matchup pitting the two regular season division winners against each other who have split the last two Canada West championships, UBC avenging their 2023 loss in Calgary with last year's 23
rd title in program history.
Both the T-Birds and Cougars have already booked their ticket to next week's U SPORTS National Championship tournament in Toronto, but aside from a higher seed up for grabs, the honour of being crowned best in the west means plenty remains at stake Saturday afternoon.
"We say it all the time, we say it on day one every year, this program's about winning, this program's about winning trophies – period," said UBC head coach,
Mike Mosher, recently named the conference's Coach of the Year for the fourth time. "It's another big game that helps to prepare you for what will come next week. But this is ten years in a row that we've been in the Canada West Final and those games do help prepare, but we want to win conference championships as well."
Mosher knows better than anyone what it takes to win a Canada West title and what that means for his team both now and long-term. The five-time national championship winning coach has 12 conference titles under his belt and has led the T-Birds to six of the last seven Canada West banners.
"You want to go in there having won your last game," Mosher continued. "It can help from a seeding standpoint (at nationals), and more often than not of late, there's not been many weaker teams once you get there. The field at nationals has been really strong."
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As the top prairie division team remaining, the Cougars were given the opportunity to host Saturday's Final. While the T-Birds enter with the better season record and leading in virtually every statistical category, the prospect of playing on the road in a potentially hostile environment gives Mount Royal that intangible advantage.Â
In their only meeting of the regular season in Calgary back on September 20, though, the T-Birds did come away with a 2-0 victory.
"I'm sure they'll have quite a big crowd, they did a couple years ago and having seen a bit of video already of some of the games played there this weekend, they had good crowds out for their games. It's kind of an intimate environment with people around it, but those are the games you want to play. Good players want to play in those kinds of atmospheres when you play for a championship. They're a program that's been emerging over the last few years and we saw firsthand how much it meant to them to win that Canada West title two years ago and we certainly don't forget that."
Advancing to Saturday's final thanks to
Henri Godbout's semifinal game winner over Fraser Valley in the dying seconds of extra time, the Cougars somehow managed to get through in even more dramatic fashion, edging the Victoria Vikes on penalties, the winning kick coming from Cougars goalkeeper Sjard Strauss.
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As dominant as UBC has been to this point in 2025, the blue and gold haven't been without their share of adversity, last Sunday's semifinal win over Fraser Valley a case in point.
"It's something we have gotten used to – every league game we play we always say we're going to see the other team's best. We've always got a big target on our back and teams will do whatever they can to try and knock us off, and that's just what it is. Our guys are up for it and year after year after year, we've shown we'll take that challenge on. Whatever is going to come, we will prepare for it and look to go out and find a way to get it done."
The 2025 Canada West Final begins at 12:00 p.m. PT Saturday, November 1 in Calgary and will be streamed live on
Canada West TV.
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