Ike MacKay |
Ike MacKay |
Ike MacKay |
Ike MacKay |
From Gabriola Island to Northern Ireland, Ike’s soccer journey covered many miles. The first three years of his life were spent on Gabriola Island and from three to twenty-three, he lived in Victoria. It was there that he had to choose between soccer and hockey. "I really liked hockey," he says, "but we could only train twice a week for one hour. There were only two arenas in Victoria at that time.”
Hockey's loss was soccer's gain, and in grade 11 his Oak Bay team won the BC championship. The next year he played for Victoria United. In his second year with Victoria United (the Victoria O’Keefes) he won the Kennedy Cup, which was made up of two teams from California, one team from BC and the Mexican National team. At 17 he was selected for the BC-U21 team that won the Canadian championship. Ike would win two more with Vic West, when he was 33 and 36 years old. At 18 he played for Canada in the Olympic preliminaries and Pan American Games.
The following summer he signed a professional contract with the Vancouver Royals of the North American Soccer League. One of the most talented players in Canadian soccer history, Ike's career was unique in that he accomplished it in an era when a soccer career was measured by a players’ success in the Greater Victoria Soccer League or the Pacific Coast Soccer League. Instead, Ike broke barriers by travelling to Europe to compete in the Northern Ireland Football League after three years of university.
He returned and finished a Bachelor's degree at UVIC and was player coach in his last year. He then completed an MA in physical education at the University of Alberta, winning the Canadian University Soccer Championship. From 1976 to 1978, Ike played for the Portland Timbers of the NASL, which was interspersed with bouts on Canada’s World Cup team.
"There were no training camps for weeks on end. We got together a week before the tournament and that was about it." Qualifying for the World Cup was difficult because Canada always had to beat Mexico whose home game was at high altitude with very polluted air.
Ike moved back to Gabriola in 1975 and taught physical education in Nanaimo for 17 years. It was there that the game of Futsal (five vs. five indoor soccer) caught his eye and he went on to coach both the men's and women's national teams.
SPONSORED BY VANCOUVER ISLAND SOCCER
From Gabriola Island to Northern Ireland, Ike’s soccer journey covered many miles. The first three years of his life were spent on Gabriola Island and from three to twenty-three, he lived in Victoria. It was there that he had to choose between soccer and hockey. "I really liked hockey," he says, "but we could only train twice a week for one hour. There were only two arenas in Victoria at that time.”
Hockey's loss was soccer's gain, and in grade 11 his Oak Bay team won the BC championship. The next year he played for Victoria United. In his second year with Victoria United (the Victoria O’Keefes) he won the Kennedy Cup, which was made up of two teams from California, one team from BC and the Mexican National team. At 17 he was selected for the BC-U21 team that won the Canadian championship. Ike would win two more with Vic West, when he was 33 and 36 years old. At 18 he played for Canada in the Olympic preliminaries and Pan American Games.
The following summer he signed a professional contract with the Vancouver Royals of the North American Soccer League. One of the most talented players in Canadian soccer history, Ike's career was unique in that he accomplished it in an era when a soccer career was measured by a players’ success in the Greater Victoria Soccer League or the Pacific Coast Soccer League. Instead, Ike broke barriers by travelling to Europe to compete in the Northern Ireland Football League after three years of university.
He returned and finished a Bachelor's degree at UVIC and was player coach in his last year. He then completed an MA in physical education at the University of Alberta, winning the Canadian University Soccer Championship. From 1976 to 1978, Ike played for the Portland Timbers of the NASL, which was interspersed with bouts on Canada’s World Cup team.
"There were no training camps for weeks on end. We got together a week before the tournament and that was about it." Qualifying for the World Cup was difficult because Canada always had to beat Mexico whose home game was at high altitude with very polluted air.
Ike moved back to Gabriola in 1975 and taught physical education in Nanaimo for 17 years. It was there that the game of Futsal (five vs. five indoor soccer) caught his eye and he went on to coach both the men's and women's national teams.
SPONSORED BY VANCOUVER ISLAND SOCCER
Elaine Dagg-Jackson |
Elaine Dagg-Jackson |
Elaine Dagg-Jackson |
Elaine Dagg-Jackson |
Elaine came to love curling honestly, albeit slowly. She was eight years old when her father, Lyall, skipped his Vancouver team to victory in the 1964 Brier. In the Dagg’s Kelowna household in those days, there was a “down” side to curling in that dad was often away from home on weekends. Sadly, Lyall died in 1975 of a rare auto-immune disorder at the age of 45. Happily, he was posthumously inducted into the Canadian Curling Hall of Fame in 2000.
As a teenager, Elaine wasn’t particularly enthusiastic about curling. She was more interested in tennis, baseball, cheerleading and hanging out with her friends. She began curling in her final years in the Okanagan and her love of the sport was sparked to the next level when they moved to Victoria in 1986. She met Pat Sanders and that started Elaine thinking about serious competition.
Elaine joined Pat, Georgina Hawkes, Louise Herlinveaux and Deb Massullo as the fifth player, and the BC representatives won the Scott Tournament of Hearts (Canadian women’s curling championship) in Lethbridge and the world title in Chicago.
In the summer of 1990, Julie Sutton’s team, which included Jodi Sutton, Melissa Soligo and Karri Williams asked Elaine if she would be their coach. She accepted and the next two years, the Sutton team (with Elaine as the fifth player), won the Scotties, was the silver medalist in the 1991 world championship, and captured a bronze medal at the 1992 Olympics in Albertville, France.
During her time with the Sutton team, Elaine, in consultation with her husband, Glen Jackson, decided on a career switch and left Copeland Communications to become a full-time curling coach. She went back to school and obtained her Level 3 coaching certificate. Her Level 4 qualification, equivalent to 12 university courses took 5 more years. Today, Elaine has attained her Level 5 standing, the highest possible, and is a Chartered Professional Coach.
Elaine has been a national-level coach since 2004 and has been hired by the Japanese (1994-2000) and (South) Korean (2001-2004) national women’s teams. Besides Albertville, Elaine coached Olympic curling teams in Nagano, Turin, Vancouver and Sochi.
In 2009, Elaine won the Coaching Association of BC’s International Coach of the Year Award and in 2012 the Joan Mead Builders Award. Since 1982, Elaine, Glen, daughter Stephanie and son Cal spend a huge portion of their time running summer curling camps in Kelowna and Parksville. It’s their way of paying back and investing in the sport they love. For Elaine, it’s also a way to share her good fortune that a lifetime commitment to curling has provided.
SPONSORED BY VICTORIA CURLING LEGACY
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