From Day 1 of their inaugural season last year when they joined the BCFC as an expansion team, the Prince George Kodiaks have held firm to their desire to develop a football culture that leans on local talent.
That philosophy remains unchanged under head coach and director of football operations Jamie Boreham, hired in December to take over the team from Keon Raymond.
Half the players who gathered on the field at Masich Place Stadium last week for the start of training camp have northern B.C. roots and most of that group are from Prince George
What has changed is Boreham has been a full-time Prince George resident ever since he started working with the team in January. The fact Boreham has remained in the city to oversee the junior program and the Kodiaks Football Academy is a radical switch from how the Kodiaks were run by Raymond, who kept his primary residence in Calgary.
“It doesn’t work, you can’t be an in-and-out coach, there’s too much going on and too much that has to happen,” said Boreham. “You’ve got to be in the area. Being here has allowed me to be at every practice, it’s allowed me to meet all the kids and their families.
“With me here, our guys have been practicing three days a week since January 5th. We had to change who we were and we had to make them ready, and the off-season is your best catch-up time. Physically they weren’t ready, mentally they weren’t ready, they didn’t understand the process. There’s been a lot of growth and the biggest thing is the players trusted that what we’re doing is the right things and I think they are seeing the benefit of the things we’ve done.”
Boreham, who played nine seasons in the CFL as a kicker with Saskatchewan, Hamilton and Toronto, was a high school phys-ed teacher and athletic director at Notre Dame College in Vancouver when he left to become head coach of the Okanagan Sun. He coached the Sun for three seasons from 2019-21 and was named BCFC coach of the year in 2021 after reaching the conference final, then resigned to attend to family matters in his Burnaby hometown. Last year the Sun went undefeated to win their third Canadian Bowl national championship.
Boreham and Kodiaks president Craig Briere have known each other for more 20 years, dating back to when Boreham played for the Saskatchewan Huskies and Briere suited up for the UBC Thunderbirds. They reconnected through the regional academy program a few years ago and last year Briere asked Boreham to attend the Kodiaks camp and returned in September as an off-field guest coach and advisor to the board.
Boreham jumped at the chance to be back at the helm of a junior team in a city where he can afford to a buy house. He and his wife Stacey, a legal assistant, are in the process of selling their house in Kelowna. They have two young children, six-year-old Beau and four-year-old Bradie.
Coming off a 1-9 season, the Kodiaks open their 2023 schedule July 29 at home against Okanagan, the first of three games this year against the defending champs.
