Underdog, no more

Will there be another Eekee Avalak this summer, and if so, who will it be?

The Cambridge Bay wrestler won the hearts of Nunavummiut, and Canadians generally, when he became Team Nunavut’s golden boy at the 2022 Canada Summer Games.

It’s hard to believe, but it has been three years since he won Nunavut’s first-ever gold medal at the event that puts athletes from every part of Canada together to compete against each other, but also to test themselves. The last time they were held, it was in Ontario’s Niagara region.

The Games are back, starting next week in St. John’s, N.L. They start Aug. 8 and run until Aug. 25.

They’re normally held every four years — like the Olympics — but the 2021 event was moved to 2022 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Team Nunavut is sending its biggest contingent to a Canada Summer Games event — with 72 athletes set to compete in basketball, wrestling, indoor volleyball and beach volleyball. There are 46 coaches, managers, youth ambassadors and staff.

Already, the teams in various sports are getting ready. Wrestlers warmed up with a tournament in Alberta last week. And the volleyball teams are in St. John’s for training.

As Canada’s smallest province or territory — in terms of population — Nunavut goes into the Games as a bit of an underdog. Its team has fewer athletes to pick from. Those athletes have fewer facilities to train in than their rivals from bigger, urban cities in the south.

But Avalak’s history-making wrestling gold medal in the 52-kg division proved it can be done. Nunavut had never medalled at the Canada Summer Games, and had only won one other medal, a bronze in judo at the 2007 Winter Games.

Following Avalak’s win, there was an uptick in the interest in wrestling in Nunavut. Of course, we know athletes can make good role models.

If nothing else comes out of a young athlete’s career, training instills discipline, self-respect and sportsmanship — traits that will serve them well for the rest of their lives.

Amateur athletes do it for the love of the game. It’s unlikely that any of these competitors will get rich on the professional volleyball circuit.

For fans, some good, honest, spirited sporting competition should offer a welcome mid-summer break from the bleak news about trade deals, starvation in Gaza, how many people are running against Pierre Poilievre in Alberta later this month, and how chummy Donald Trump was with Jeffrey Epstein before he became president of the United States.

Win or lose, it’s good for both athletes and fans to have something for everyone to look forward to.