Houseboat claims Cougars and Eagle

With Game 7 of the Cougars vs Eagles game fast approaching, both Cougars SuperCoach Stu Grills and Eagles coach Chris Freeman had their play books thrown into disarray this morning with news that a Long Weekend houseboat trip resulted in two of their key players succumbing to season threatening injuries in separate yet shocking incidents...

What was supposed to be a relaxing and enjoyable weekend get together to promote friendly rivalries and cross communication between a number of Vancouver Cougar and Burnaby Eagles players, quickly turned ugly with injuries to two of the teams key position players.

Early on before things turned ugly

In the first ugly incident...as the hours wore on the houseboat and the drinks were flowing fast and free, a serious game of one-up-manship emerged to see who could perform the most spectacular entry into Okanagan lake from the top deck of the houseboat. It started innocently enough with a couple of nice jumps,...then it was onto the dives,... then it was the backflip in...then it was the handstand on the deck before the backflip in...eventually contestants moved onto humour to get the big votes. Stevie Harper's Forest Gump "Lieutenant Dan" leap from the Shrimp Boat impersonation quickly became a crowd favourite.

Cougars centreman Doug Vargo decided that naturally all previous shenanigans had to be topped. With so many quality tricks already pulled off to that point, it was deduced that his winning move would be to take a leap off the top deck doing the "Running Man". Unfortunately, as he leap off the boat and sailed through mid air his legs were pumping so fast, his right hamstring could not keep up with the pace and was well and truly pulled out of position... an ugly incident.

Moving so fast the camera could barely keep up...the exact moment Vargo's hammy went "pop"

Shortly thereafter, the trip was thrown further into disarray when another man went down. With few observers being around to confirm the complete facts of the story, a large thud on the side of the boat was followed by a slightly concussed Eagle - Chuck Buchanan emerging from the water barely able to walk. Apparently he had been pushed off the top deck by two unnamed assailants and smacked the bridge of both feet on the bottom level railing before hitting the water.

Buchanan, clutching his legs in agony as he heads for a crash landing in the water

With no immediate explanation available to explain why someone would throw Chuck overboard, conspiracy theories have quickly begun to abound. Suspicions have emerged that sensing his own injury would lead to a month off football, none other than Cougars Skip Vargo may have "arranged" the injury delivered to Buchanan in order to even things up and ensure the Cougars would not be a man down for this weekend's vital clash against the Eagles.

When approached with these startling claims this morning outside his South Granville Penthouse, Vargo was quick to deny the allegations, adamantly stating that he would pursue such extreme lengths off the field, to put another player out of action. When then asked if he might instead "arrange" such an incident, Vargo abruptly called the interview to a close stating that he was late for his first session in the UBC Oxygen chamber at UBC (in his attempt to speed up his healing process) and that he had no more time for questions.