Hawks trample Waterloo at home

The Wilfrid Laurier University Golden Hawks are no longer a team in search of an identity.

After their 44-0 win against the University of Waterloo moved them to 2-1 this season, the Hawks made their presence known in the league with a combination of exceptional running and kicking, a speedy defence and a passing offence that does damage when it executes.

As long as running back Dillon Campbell is standing in the backfield, the Hawks are going to run the ball often, as demonstrated in the past three games.

His 204 yards on Saturday puts him up to 674 this season.

After an eight-game season last year, he led Ontario University Athletics with 867 yards, an average of 108 per game. After three games this season, he is averaging 224 yards a game.

Campbell only played two quarters on Saturday, as he was taken out to rest early in the third.

“They know Dillon is our guy. We kind of had a goal to get him 200 yards at some point and get him out of the game. So we got his 200 yards and we got some other good backs in there,” said head coach Michael Faulds.

“It’s crazy to think about it,” Campbell said. “Guys joked around at half like ‘DC only 169 so far, what’s going on?’ But realistically that’s a great game.

Last season my most in one game was 180 against Waterloo, and now I’m averaging 200 per game.”

Fourth-year kicker Ronnie Pfeffer is also making huge waves this season. On Saturday he became the fifth player in Laurier history to have 200 career points. He also tied the school record for field goals made in a game with five, as well as kicking the longest field goal in school history at 50 yards.

Pfeffer now leads the OUA with the longest field goal, as well as the longest average punt distance at 44.3 yards. His 45 points so far this year trails only McMaster University’s kicker Tyler Crapigna, who has 47.

“Ronnie is kicking that ball like you wouldn’t believe … he’s worked really hard this last year so it is good to see it paying off,” Faulds said.
Pfeffer touched on his success and attributed it to his teammates’ help in the off-season.

“Personally, it’s been great, but there is a lot still to do in the season. This summer I was working really hard,” he said. “Everyone in the summer was just helping me and trying to make the whole team successful.”

The Hawks defence has shown speed and strength this season and leads the OUA in sacks with 10. They have also been strong against the run, only allowing 83 yards per game.

However, they are in the bottom three in the league in penalties per game, averaging about 15. The Hawks have lost 440 yards this year on penalties, which could hurt them as they play the better teams in the province.

The club now heads into a bye week and they’ll need all the time they can get to rest up their team. Marcus Arkarakas and Will Pitt-Doe did not dress for the game against Waterloo after going down in the loss to Windsor.

Faulds discussed what this week will involve for the team.

“It’ll be almost like training camp mode where we get all of our young guys some good reps, and get some guys healthy too. It’ll be another week to get a lot of our starters back hopefully for homecoming,” he said.

The Carleton Ravens make their way to University Stadium on Saturday Sept. 27 at 1 p.m.