The Lakehead Thunderwolves are the

U Sports U Sports (stylized as U SPORTS) is the national sport governing body for universities in Canada, comprising the majority of degree-granting universities in the country and four regional conferences: Ontario University Athletics (OUA), Résea ...

varsity athletic teams that represent

Lakehead University Lakehead University is a public research university with campuses in Thunder Bay and Orillia, Ontario, Canada. Lakehead University, shortened to 'Lakehead U', is non-denominational and provincially supported. It has undergraduate programs, gradua ...

Thunder Bay Thunder Bay is a city in and the seat of Thunder Bay District, Ontario, Canada. It is the most populous municipality in Northwestern Ontario and the second most populous (after Greater Sudbury) municipality in Northern Ontario. Its population i ...

Ontario Ontario is the southernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Located in Central Canada, Ontario is the Population of Canada by province and territory, country's most populous province. As of the 2021 Canadian census, it ...

, Canada.

Overview

The Lakehead Thunderwolves are perennial powers in the OUA and

in Nordic Skiing and wrestling. The women's and men's Nordic ski teams won both the OUA conference and CIS-CCUNC national team championships in both 2005 and 2006. The women's and men's team four-peated for the OUA Championships in 2008 while the women won their fifth consecutive CIS-CCUNC national championship. The men's wrestling team is ranked in the U Sports Top 10 each year and the women's team is ranked in the North American Top 15. As of 2012, the women have continued their string of dominant performances, having now accomplished the 8-peat for CCUNC championships. Their men's hockey program, resumed in 2001–02, annually leads the U Sports in attendance with minor pro attendance numbers (3000 per game) and has become one of the better programs in U Sports men's ice hockey. The team won the OUA Queen's Cup conference championship in 2005–06, defeating the

McGill Redmen The McGill Redbirds (formerly the McGill Redmen) and McGill Martlets are the varsity athletic teams that represent McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. History In 1868, the first recorded game of rugby in North America occurred in M ...

in the one-game final, and subsequently placed second at the

National Championships A national championship(s) is the top achievement for any sport or competition, contest within a league of a particular nation or nation state. The title is usually awarded by contests, ranking systems, stature, ability, etc. This determines the be ...

Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Alberta. It is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Central Alberta ...

. In each of its seven seasons, the hockey team has won at least one playoff round and has gone 14–2 on home ice in the playoffs. The Thunderwolves have qualified for the National Championship twice in seven seasons of play. They hosted the National Championships in

2009 2009 was designated as the International Year of Astronomy by the United Nations to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei's first known astronomical studies with a telescope and the publication of Astronomia Nova by Joha ...

and

2010 The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...

. It has an intense, and at times brutally violent, rivalry with the

Western Mustangs The Western Mustangs are the athletic teams that represent University of Western Ontario, Western University in London, Ontario, Canada. The school's athletic program supports 46 Varsity team, varsity teams. Their mascot is a Mustang named J.W. a ...

. Lakehead University previously had a men's ice hockey team called the Lakehead Nor'Westers. The 1966–67 team coached by Hank Akervall and led by captain Dave Siciliano won the International Collegiate Hockey Association (ICHA) championship. Men's and women's basketball, women's volleyball, track, and cross country have had varying degrees of success, and most of these programs have shown improvement over the past couple seasons. The alpine skiing team (a club sport) competes as one of a small handful of Canadian schools in the

United States Collegiate Ski and Snowboard Association The United States Collegiate Ski and Snowboard Association (USCSA) is the sports federation for collegiate skiing and snowboarding in the United States. With over 180 member colleges, the USCSA fields some 5,000 men and women, alpine, Nordic, fr ...

(USCSA), including University of British Columbia and a few others.

Varsity sports

Broadcasts

Lakehead broadcasts many games with live video webcasts, which can be accessed off Lakehead's two athletic sites. All sports are broadcast except Nordic skiing. Basketball is carried live on

campus radio Campus radio (also known as college radio, university radio or student radio) is a type of radio station that is run by the students of a college, university or other educational institution. Programming may be exclusively created or produced ...

station CILU-FM and webcast o
SSN Canada
SSN Canada Men's away hockey games used to be carried by commercial station Rock94, but just recently the station discontinued this service.

References

External links

* {{U Sports volleyball U Sports teams Lakehead University Sport in Thunder Bay