Noah Cantor was enjoying life after pro football, running Vera’s Burger Shack, his Vancouver restaurant chain, and shooting hoops with his pals, when one of his buddies suggested he try out for Canada’s Maccabiah rugby team.
He thought at first that his friend, Alex Cristall, was joking. Cantor, 38, hadn’t played competitive rugby since high school, although he butted plenty of heads as a defensive lineman in the Canadian Football League from 1995 to 2006. In two stints with the Toronto Argos and one with the B.C. Lions, Cantor won four Grey Cups and was named a CFL all-star in 2004.
Apparently the rugby idea was not so outlandish. He got a call from the team’s coach inviting him on the team, and before he knew it, he was working out with other Vancouver-based rugby players, preparing for the trip to Israel for the Games.
So far, it’s been only “touch rugby,” Cantor said. “Hopefully, it’s going to be like riding a bike.”
As a beefy guy – he weighs in at 255 pounds, 10 pounds lighter than his CFL days – he’ll be playing forward in the second row. “It’s like a lineman. They do the pushing… It’s like what I did for years.”
Mark Winokur, the Toronto-based head coach of the team, pointed out that Cantor is only one part of the 22-man team and may not get into games until later in the tournament. Unlike Cantor, the rest of the guys play club rugby, many at a very high level. “All these guys have a good background in the game.”
Tryouts for the team were held last August in Toronto and in September in Vancouver. The bulk of the team hails from Ontario, but there are also sizeable contingents from Quebec and British Columbia. Only four players are holdovers from last Maccabiah, when the team failed to medal.
“This is a younger team, with two or three guys in their 30s,” said Winokur, who was twice named coach of the year by Rugby Ontario, most recently in 2008. “The rest are in their early 20s.”
Winokur, who played in the Games on the 1989 team, said the team’s youth and speed and athleticism means “we’ll probably play a running game,” sort of like the fast break in basketball.
The Maccabiah tournament includes six countries, with teams from Canada, the United States, Israel, Australia, Britain and Chile vying for medals. Most of the other teams are mysteries, but Winokur expects the Americans to be strong, thanks to their “enormous Jewish population and tons of money.”
Winokur expects most of the teams will face the same problem of creating a cohesive unit out of players that span a country. The Canadian players have been asked to get in shape and train hard, but they won’t get together as a unit until they gather in Toronto in early July. The rugby team, along with other squads, will then hold a training camp to prepare for the Games.
With a fairly youthful group to mould into a team, Winokur expects Cantor “to bring a level of professionalism that the younger guys will learn from.”
For his part, Cantor is looking forward to “a great opportunity to go to Israel and experience the Games. It’s our Olympics, right?”
For Cantor, the Maccabiah will mark his second visit to Israel. When he was 16, he visited the Holy Land on a Jewish youth trip from his home in Ottawa. He still has great memories from that trip but he’s been told the country has changed a lot since that summer 22 years ago.
Winokur, who coached the 2005 team, is likewise eager to get back to Israel. “It’s a rare opportunity to play and compete against athletes from around the world and see Israel,” he said.