A dynamic contingent of Canadians competed at the 27th Summer Universiade in Kazan, Russia, alongside athletes from 163 countries. Representing Canada were 308 athletes, with a number of them coming from the University of Toronto and Varsity Blues teams. Alongside the athletes were U of T staff functioning as members of the Summer 2013 Universiade mission staff for the Canadian delegation. These included chief therapist Dinah Hampson, communications officer Jill Clark, and medical extern David Lawrence.
In total there were 27 scheduled events at the tournament. To be eligible to compete in this summer’s Universiade, athletes had to be full-time students at a post-secondary institution — university, college, or CEGEP — or have graduated from a post-secondary institution in the year preceding the Universiade. This year, Canada won a total of two gold, five silver, and nine bronze medals. .
The largest team competing was for track and field, with 51 team members including the Varsity Blues’ Sarah Wells, Alicia Brown, and Khamica Bingham. Swimming Canada’s roster consisted of 38 athletes, six of whom were Blues athletes: Heather Maitland, Paige Schultz, Zack Chetrat, Frank Despond, Edward Liu, and Chris Manning. The present and past success of the Blues women’s track and field team and the men’s swimming team highly impacted the choice of the recruitment staff of the Canadian team, resulting in the high number of athletes from U of T on the teams.
Chetrat placed seventh in the men’s 200-metre butterfly while Schultz won two of Canada’s bronze medals in the 4×100-metre and 4×200-metre freestyle relay teams and finished seventh in the women’s 200-metre individual medley.
Blues women’s track stars Wells and Brown also performed very well in the competition, with Canada taking second place in the 4×400-metre relay team with a 3:32:93 finish; Russia placed first, and South Africa, third. Earlier in the competition, Wells — a former Olympian — placed fourth in the women’s 400-metre hurdles. Brown placed fifth in the 400-metre race and, with her time of 52.08 seconds, earned a place at the International Association of Athletics Federations’ competition taking place later this summer.
Team Canada’s women’s rugby sevens team, including Blues’ player Karla Telidetzki , took an impressive 36–0 victory for the bronze medal against Great Britain. It was the first team sport medal that Canada won this year at the Universiade, just past the midway point of the tournament.
With the help of Varsity Blues players Mario Kovacevic and Dylan Bams, the men’s soccer team ranked seventh overall after a 3–1comeback against Malaysia. Kovacevic, a strong leader on the Blues’ soccer team who is entering his final year at U of T, scored the third goal of the match. Earlier in the tournament, Kovacevic scored a crucial goal in a match against Peru, resulting in a 2–0 win for the Canadian men and allowing them to advance further in the tournament. However, Canada’s hopes of advancing in the tournament ended with a 1–0 loss to Ukraine. Bams scored one of two goals in a draw against France in a draw in the team’s first game at the tournament.
Canada’s women’s basketball team finished eighth in the tournament, after an unfortunate 60–55 loss to Hungary with Blues women’s basketball head coach Michèle Belanger as assistant coach. The Blues new men’s basketball coach John Campbell, who was previously with the Dalhousie team, also represented the Blues in Kazan as assistant coach of the men’s team.
Finally, Blues volleyball star Charlotte Sider placed 13th in beach volleyball with partner Rachel Cockrell. They split their six-game run 3–3, losing their final match to the Czech team 2–1, preventing them from advancing to the semi-finals.
