It’s a 13-minute drive from the O’Hagan Field and the Vancouver College campus to B.C. Place in downtown Vancouver. The journey to get there as a football player is a much longer and circuitous route.
Just ask Toronto Argonauts co-defensive coordinator Kevin Eiben.
This Sunday, Eiben and his Argos will try to win the 111th edition of the Grey Cup when they face the favoured Winnipeg Blue Bombers at B.C. Place.
Coaching in a Grey Cup is a long way from playing high school football with the Fighting Irish.
“V.C. was a stepping stone for my opportunity to go down to the U.S. and get a scholarship after high school football. Without Vancouver College, I would never had the opportunity to go play at Bucknell University. I have a lot of great memories. I still keep in touch with all my close friends from VC,” says Eiben, who was hoping to re-connect with some of them.
The private Catholic school located on Hudson Street in Vancouver’s South Granville neighborhood has been a football factory for decades. CFL stars such as Vince Danielsen, Sean Fleming, Chris Burns, Bryan Chiu, Matt Clarke, Peter Dyakowski, Mark and Angus Reid and others all played at V.C.
Current B.C. Lion Christian Covington, who spent a decade in the NFL, also played his high school football at Vancouver College.
Football has always been a part of Eiben’s life. His dad Larry played safety at the University of Cincinnati and his brother L.J. was drafted by the Lions in 1996.
A Delta B.C. native, Eiben played his minor football at North Delta and then Richmond before enrolling at Vancouver College in the early 1990’s. When it comes to high school memories, it’s not the games that Eiben remembers first, it’s the relationships.
“We've been together for so long. We've built friendships since Grade 8. We're going on 25 to 30 years. So right now, it brings back memories. It's not just the sports we played together with basketball and football. It was all the sports we played. It was also hanging out after school and getting together at guys houses,” said Eiben.
Eiben was a standout for the Irish on both sides of the ball as he patterned his game after a couple of Baltimore Raven greats in Ray Lewis and Ed Reed. After his time at VC, Eiben wound up at Bucknell, a small private arts school in Pennsylvania that competes in Division 1 FCS – a rung below the big boys of the NCAA.
“My father put together about 100 VHS tapes. We sent them out to Division 2 and (then) Division 1-AA schools. I'll never forget Coach Kotu (David Kotulski) reached out and said, 'would you be interested in coming to Bucknell for a visit?' We went down, saw the school, saw the academics and how highly it was ranked and thought this is a no-brainer - this is going to be a great four years. It turned out to be one of the best decisions in my life,” said Eiben.
From there, Eiben was selected by the Argos in the fourth round of the 2001 CFL Draft. He played 11 seasons with the Argos before finishing his playing days with Hamilton in 2012. He won a Grey Cup with the Argos as a player in 2004 and was a CFL All-Star on three occasions (2004, 2005, 2007).
When his playing days ended, He took a front office job with Hamilton and also was part of a training centre but football kept calling.
“To be honest, after I retired, I didn't know what I wanted to do. I was working with the Tiger-Cats when I ran into Stefan Ptaszek, who was the head coach at McMaster University. He asked me if I was interested in interviewing for the defensive coordinator position," he said. "I wound up getting the job and spent four years at the U-Sports level and then had an opportunity to meet with Marc Trestman to start my coaching career in the CFL as the Argos special-teams coordinator in 2017. I've been going on 20 years now with the Argos."
Eiben has won two Grey Cups as a coach with the Argos in 2017 and 2022 but winning one in his hometown would be extra special. He’ll be on the hook for 10 tickets for family and friends with more friends coming on their own to see their old friend. But Eiben knows that this is a business trip, not a social visit.
“I grew up here in B.C. It's my home. Anytime I get a chance to come back and see the family, it's special. But right now, our whole mindset is about bringing the “A” game on Sunday. It's going to come down to execution, communication and physicality. We're going to try to get these guys ready to play for Sunday and play at a very, very high level,” he said.
Funny. Whether it’s O’Hagan Field or B.C. Place, the formula for winning is the same.
And it’s a formula that Kevin Eiben knows well.
Veteran B.C. sports personality Bob “the Moj” Marjanovich writes twice weekly for Black Press Media.
