Johany Jutras/CFL
CFL.ca Staff
TORONTO — The 2015 CFL National Combine is here.
It’s the most important time of the year for the nine CFL teams watching, and possibly of a lifetime for the athletes participating; a time for the country’s top amateur football athletes to shine as they congregate in Toronto, Ont. hoping to take the next step in their careers.
From the results of this week’s three regional combines to who will contend to win the bench press, CFL.ca’s National Combine Primer has you covered as the weekend kicks off.
Regional Combines: The path less taken
While most players on the National Combine roster are there on a larger body of work, the implementation of regional combines in 2013 opened the door for those that may have been missed to earn an invite.
Three regional combines held across Canada in Edmonton, Montreal and Toronto helped 11 players add their names to the list of this weekend’s participants, cementing a roster of Canada’s top amateur talent on full display for scouts, coaches and general managers.
Here are the 11 players added to the roster this weekend:
Melvin Abankwah, RB, Saint Mary’s (Added from TOR)
Matt Rea, RB, Michigan State (Added from TOR)
William Langlais, RB, Sherbrooke (Added from MTL)
Mikhail Davidson, REC, Montreal (Added from MTL)
Quinn Lawlor, OL, Brigham Young (Added from EDM)
Jean-Samuel Blanc, DL, Montreal (Added from MTL)
Kahlen Branning, DB, Regina (Added from EDM)
Dexter Janke, DB, Okanagan (Added from EDM)
Anthony Coady, DB, Montreal (Added from MTL)
Auston Johnson, LB, South Dakota (Added from EDM)
Louis Mensah, LB, Fort Lewis College (Added from TOR)
» Edmonton Regional Combine Results
» Montreal Regional Combine Results
» Toronto Regional Combine Results
» Regional Combine Leaderboard
While regional combine participants not selected to take part in the National Combine could still get drafted after catching the eyes of GMs, those invited to this weekend’s combine in Toronto are giving themselves the advantage of having two workouts in front of CFL teams. In 2014, all but one of the regional combine participants invited to the National Combine were drafted.
Further Reading: Earning an invite to the National Combine always was the goal, but the 11 prospects moving on this weekend don’t have it easy. They face the task of doing a second combine in less than a week’s span. What are the challenges of doing two combines in one week, both physically and mentally?
Combine Day 1: Saturday
While the official first day of the combine starts on Friday with medicals and measurements, Saturday is when the action truly kicks off, starting first thing in the morning with the event everyone comes to watch: the bench press.
This is a sheer test of brute strength, with players lifting 225 pounds over their head for as many repetitions as they can. The CFL record is 47 set by Wilfrid Laurier offensive lineman Michael Knill in 2011, a number no one has since come close to matching. Some say this year that Montreal linebacker Byron Archambeault has his sights set on the record.
CFL.ca Combine Insider Justin Dunk speaks with Don Landry about how the bench press sets the tone for the entire combine, as they tee up Day 1 of the 2015 CFL Combine:
