‘Start fresh:’ Rams complete 2019 spring camp

The University of Regina Rams are looking forward to the 2019 Canada West football season after a 2018 the team wishes it could forget.

Last year was filled with many hurdles, from the team being stripped of most of its wins due to an ineligible player to a player getting charged with assault to quarterback Noah Picton suffering a season-ending injury.

“It’s an opportunity for some new blood to come out and turn the page on last season and start fresh and start new,” head coach Stephen Bryce said Sunday during the final day of the Rams’ spring camp.

The team is preparing to get younger, with players like Picton, tailback Atlee Simon and linebacker Danny Nesbitt having exhausted their U Sports eligibility.

“It’s kind of a youth movement and sometimes those are really healthy things to have every once in a  while,” Bryce said.

Another player the Rams won’t have this season is running back Kyle Borsa, who had a breakout campaign in 2018. Borsa has been suspended after testing positive for a banned substance that was in a workout supplement he was taking.

“He had changed brands and he had talked to the vendor at the store who assured him that it was all legit, which those guys don’t know,” said Bryce, who noted the substance, higenamine, wasn’t on the list of banned substances a year ago.

“I tell the guys everything that’s on the list at one time wasn’t,” Bryce said. “The guys are responsible for everything that goes in their body. (Borsa) knows that, he takes responsibility for it.”

One of the players who will be taking on more of a leadership role will be fifth-year receiver Ryan Schienbein, who was participating in his final spring camp with the team.

“It’s exciting, it goes fast but it has been an honour and a privilege to spend five years with the Rams,” he said.

Schienbein said the team has a lot of young guys who will be looking to fill the shoes of the departed players.

For the first time in a few seasons, the Rams didn’t have a clear-cut starting quarterback at spring camp. The team has five quarterbacks — Josh Donnelly, Colton Hippe, Bryden O’Flaherty, Thomas Hyett and Seb Britton — but Britton is currently injured and his status for the season is unknown.