As the Laurier Golden Hawks get set for their first game of the 2025 season, head coach and reigning Frank Tindall Trophy winner Michael Faulds sat down with OB.SESSED to give some insight into how the program will look as it transitions from a dominant 2024 season into 2025.
Even though he is only 41 years old, Michael Faulds is a seasoned coaching veteran in U SPORTS football. The former quarterback for the Western Mustangs, Faulds enjoyed a stellar university sporting career, winning two Yates Cups and earning two Dalt White Trophies as the championship's MVP along the way.
Beginning with a stint as the offensive coordinator at York from 2010-2012, Faulds has been on a coaching staff at the U SPORTS level for 15 years now. Faulds took the Lions' offence to new heights, improving their yardage per game from 25th in the country to 7th before fully immersing himself in purple and gold after being named the sixth head coach of the Golden Hawks in 2013.
Since his hiring, Laurier has steadily risen to the pinnacle of the OUA football, appearing in four Yates Cups and winning two of them. With Taylor Elgersma behind centre for a fourth season in 2024, Faulds led Laurier to the program's first perfect season in 19 years, which culminated in a showdown against the Laval Rouge et Or in the 59th Vanier Cup.
The season led to his second Frank Tindall Trophy as the best coach in the country, the first coming in 2016 in his fourth year leading the team. Faulds maintains a 54-33 regular season record heading into the 2025 season.
signed a new five-year contract to remain the head coach of the Golden Hawks until 2030.
Faulds told 3DownNation's Justin Dunk in February.
Faulds says he and his Golden Hawks are driven by what was almost a reality in 2024 — a perfect regular season followed by the team's first national championship since 2005.
"Going into 2024, it was all about knowing that we had the talent," says Faulds. "Keeping everybody humble, and keeping everyone's work ethic at the forefront of their mindsets."
The previous year, 2023, represented an enormous leap towards the peak of the OUA, as Laurier went 7-1 in conference play before a 29-14 defeat in the 2023 Yates Cup at the hands of the Mustangs. Everything was pointing towards the team being even better in 2024.
"I think everyone knew on paper we had a great team, we were bringing back the reigning OUA MVP in Taylor Elgersma, so I think everyone knew the talent was there and it was probably going to be Western and us again," he adds. "But it is one thing to see that talent on paper, as it is another thing for people to actually live up to those expectations."
The ultimate goal of any team is a perfect season, and to achieve that requires meticulous preparation. Preparation of the most intense and detail-oriented form. To Faulds and the rest of the coaching staff, that degree of scheming and being ready starts early, in training camp.
"I am very much concerned with our process and our body of work, which I talk about a lot with our players," says the well-decorated coach.
"I actually tell them that the games have been decided when we report to camp based on our offseason. I spend more energy and time on our offseason and summer training, and during the season, that becomes an opportunity for the coordinators to shine. Coach Galloway, Coach VanMoerkerke, Coach Daly, Coach Robichaud, they are the masterminds of the X's and O's. It is my job as head coach to ensure that our guys are prepared with how they train their bodies, how they work, and how they do in the classroom to be eligible."
Faulds told 3DownNation's Justin Dunk in February that despite interest from the CFL, he plans to stay in the university ranks for a long time. Photo: Darla Furlani/Golden Hawks
Since the way in which preparation is undertaken at Laurier is so systematic and calculated, Coach Faulds likes to equate its process to the game of chess. "I often use the chess analogy in the offseason, since everyone is starting maybe as a pawn, or a rook or a knight. Well, if you were a rook the previous year, can you transform into a queen this offseason? If you were a pawn, could you transform into a bishop this year?"
Improvement by the day is vital to the overall process of preparing for a season at Laurier. Even though there are certainly some great pieces on Laurier's chessboard to utilize, Coach Faulds considers his coordinators — "the chessmasters to be integral to how those pieces are used on game day.
Since there is a tremendous overall coaching structure in place at Laurier capable of handling the pressures and tribulations of an OUA matchday, Faulds is free to focus on the more intrinsic details of the team as they lead up to a game.
Faulds was presented with the second Frank Tindall Trophy of his young career in November, recognizing the country's Coach of the Year. Photo: OUA/Provided.
"Preparation for me in-season is all about the little details leading up to kickoff. I concern myself more with everything outside of the three hours on game day," says Faulds. "Is everyone at their lifts? Is everyone going to class? Is everyone going to therapy? Is everyone giving great effort at practice? If we do all of those things, I tell our guys, 'you can live with no regrets'. It means at the final whistle, we will have no regrets and the outcome is the outcome because our preparation, our process, and our body of work were airtight."
After any season, regardless of sport or the level at which it is played, there is a more likely than unlikely chance that changes, in some form, will occur. Whether they be departures, arrivals, promotions, or demotions, change tends to come quickly in sports.
If you survey the U SPORTS football landscape and compare how it appeared at the start of the 2024 season to now, there is no bigger departure than that of Elgersma, Laurier's first Hec Crighton winner since Bill Kubas in 1994.
"I think the biggest thing fans will have to get used to is number 13 not taking the snaps under centre anymore," responds Faulds when asked about Elgersma. "But, what fans will see is that the quality and the depth of the roster did not take a dip at all."
Throughout Laurier's history, they have established a reputation for producing great defensive lines. From legends like Veron Stiliadis, the only defensive lineman in Golden Hawks history to win the J.P. Metras Award, Reinhardt Keller, and Kojo Millington, to the ferocious lineman of today, Laurier's penchant for moulding young adults into great defensive linemen has stood the test of time.
"I think the defensive line is a position that our Laurier community and the greater OUA and U SPORTS landscape is going to get familiar with," adds the coach, "because we roll out a lot of depth and talent onto the field at that position."
To illustrate the returning dominance of this defensive line, Omari Hastings, Marcus Tenney, and Matteo Laquintana all recorded three or more tackles for loss in 2024, and they are expected to be back in 2025.
Leadership is crucial in university sports. Having a bona fide leader in the locker room who knows how to rally everyone together in the darkest moments of a season, or how to inspire action through their play on the field, is an invaluable asset. As there were some meaningful departures from the team after 2024, it is expected that some new faces will step into those leadership roles at Laurier in 2025.
"Jaxon Stebbings has been a great leader for us, and our best leader on the team is number 11, Layomi Ojutalayo. Layomi has really improved a great deal as a receiver, and he also happens to be our best special teams player. I think when everyone looked at the Yates Cup's box score, they thought, 'That must be a typo, how does a receiver have five tackles?' Well, Layomi had five tackles just on special teams in the Yates Cup."
Standing at 6'3" and weighing 209 pounds, Ojutalayo is a freak of an athlete and showed glimpses of his natural receiving abilities with 414 yards and three touchdowns in 2024, including a two touchdown performance against Queen's back on Oct. 5.
Entering his fourth year, Ojutalayo looks like he will fit seamlessly into the 2025 Golden Hawks offence as it takes on a younger tone with players like Cooper Hamilton and Tanner Nelmes graduating.
But even though some big offensive names have left the program after contributing wildly to the successes of the past few seasons, there is no question that there is still loads of talent on the offensive side of the ball.
"Offensively, we are not lacking talent. I think in the return game, Tayshaun Jackson was obviously an All-Canadian, but people also saw what he can do at running back as well, so I look for him to have a big year," adds the coach. "And then we return Quentin Scott, who did not play last year but will return for this campaign. Our backfield will be super stout and dangerous."
For whoever will step into the role of QB1 for the Laurier Golden Hawks in 2025, the wide variety of skillsets around him will surely help to relieve in-game stressors. "Whoever comes out as the starting quarterback at the helm of the offence does not have a lot of pressure. I think the outside world thinks 'how do you replace number 13?' but we have so much talent in the backfield, lots of talent at receiver, and a veteran offensive line that I look at our new quarterback as just a facilitator."
And even with Elgersma's departure, there's lots of reasons to be excited about the 2025 Golden Hawks. "I think in terms of their play, people got a glimpse, late in the year when Raidan Thorne went down, of just how talented a guy like Ryan Hughes is," says Faulds. "Ultra-talented, played in the Yates Cup, played in the Uteck and the Vanier, and had the most touchdowns during that run out of any receiver in U SPORTS. I look for him to be a household name this year."
During his sophomore year, Hughes mainly served as an occasional kick-and-punt returner. However, in the Yates Cup against Western, the 6'2" receiver exploded for seven receptions and a touchdown, good for 113 yards, which was more than his entire season to date. In the Uteck Bowl, he bested his previous mark, recording 212 yards on eight receptions, three of which went for touchdowns.
2024 was an outstanding representation of scaling a mountaintop. A perfect season, a Yates Cup victory over the mighty Western Mustangs, and a trip to the Vanier Cup against Laval are all hallmarks of a steady growth since 2013 into a powerhouse program. However, a significant danger that many good sports teams fall victim to is focusing on the past while preparing for the future. This sentiment has not escaped Coach Faulds in the least.
"I said it right to our guys when we first came back for 2025 in our first meeting back in January," says Faulds. "Our biggest obstacle as a new team in 2025 is thinking about or reminiscing about anything that happened in 2024. Every single year, you have new players, new staff, new everything, and you can't just, whether it was a good year or bad, think that anything that happened the year before will dictate what happens the next year."
If any one trait of a football team can heavily contradict reminiscing on previous achievements, it is that of complete and utter determination to stay motivated about the future.
"I have seen it during these summer months, and across the offseason, we have a very motivated group," says Faulds. "It is a talented group with confidence that we can get back to the Yates Cup and the Vanier, but it is not one that just thinks it and is unwilling to put in any of the work."
Faulds passed for over 10,000 yards during his career in purple, and held the country's all-time yardage record until it was surpassed by Sherbrooke's Jérémi Roch in 2015. Photo: Mustangs/Provided
"As I mentioned earlier, I am all about the process and the body of work, and our guys truly believe that they have to work hard and they are committed to doing that. So for me, the goals always remain the same. We want to win a Yates Cup and always want to win the Vanier Cup. Everyone says that, but the reality is that there are only four to five teams that actually have a legitimate shot at accomplishing that, and I feel we are one of those four to five teams in 2025."
2025 will mark Fauld's 12th season of head coaching duties at Wilfrid Laurier University. He came into the role as a 29-year-old and has learned a lot about what it means to be a head football coach at the U SPORTS level over those 11 years. Entering the coaching stratosphere at such a young age is no small task, as you are repeatedly thrown into the fray with multiple components to handle and are learning on the fly. Faulds says a primary key to dealing with the stresses that come with coaching at this level as a young person is understanding what is possible to control and what is not.
"Back then, I stressed about uncontrollables a little bit too much," says Faulds. "I now spend my energy stressing about things that I can control and that our team can control. At the end of the day, things that don't help us get first downs and prevent us from stopping them, I try not to let them bother me as much. All of my decisions now, as a coach who has been here for 12 years, are centred around what will help us on game day and what will help our players reach the games in the fall as the best version of themselves. I stress about those decisions, not some of the other stuff, and I think it takes time as a coach to realize that importance."