Waterloo Warriors - Waterloo Warriors Football

Waterloo Warriors Football

The Waterloo Warriors football team has been in operation since 1957, winning two Yates Cup conference championships in 1997 and 1999. Currently, they are one of six teams to have never appeared in a Vanier Cup game and the longest tenured program in the OUA to have never qualified for the national championship game. The team was coached by Dennis McPhee, who is the former head coach of the St. Francis Xavier X-Men football team where he won Atlantic University Sport coach of the year in 2002. McPhee resigned as head coached on November 22, 2011.

In recent years, the program has struggled to compete in the OUA, having not qualified for the playoffs since 2002 and not having a winning record since 2001. The program then made national headlines in 2010 after it was discovered that a student athlete was in possession of steroids and human growth hormone in March 2010. The school then conducted a steroid investigation that had led to all 65 members of its team tested for steroids on March 31, with three positive results. Consequently, on June 14, 2010, the school announced that the program would be suspended for the 2010 season. While the football team returned for the 2011 season, it proved difficult as many players transferred to other schools after they learned they would not be able to play at Waterloo that year. Consequently, the Warriors finished winless in eight games in their return to the OUA.

A highlight for the long-suffering Warriors was a 35-21 playoff win over the Western Mustangs in 1999 in the last game ever played at Western's J. W. Little Stadium.