O'Leary: Elks dig into their past to move forward
Yesterday at 10:14 AM
We don’t know exactly when the Edmonton Elks’ home opener will be yet in 2025, but I can tell you the first thing that should happen when the team sets foot on the turf at Commonwealth Stadium.
The Elks need to add Ed Hervey’s name to their Wall of Honour.
Hervey was a key piece on a pair of Grey Cup-winning squads as a player. He retired and went directly into the team’s scouting department in 2007, climbing the ladder at a firefighter’s pace, to be named the team’s general manager in 2013. Just two years later he’d built the team that brought the franchise its first Grey Cup in 10 years.
Then things went a little sideways. Hervey was abruptly fired in 2017, pulling him away from the franchise that he was rooted in for almost 20 years. Chris Morris, the team’s new president and CEO, described Hervey on Wednesday as someone who represents what the organization now strives to be under Larry Thompson’s ownership.
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Chris Morris and Ed Hervey were teammates on Edmonton’s 2005 Grey Cup-winning squad (The Canadian Press)
His initial run as the team’s GM wasn’t always the smoothest, but Hervey always had a clear plan and his team-building ability is undeniable. He should be celebrated for assembling that Grey Cup-winning team and with hindsight being 20/20, he should have been celebrated as a player at the team’s home opener in 2014, before he’d worked his first game as the team’s GM.
Anything can happen — good or bad — when you’re sitting in that chair, running the organization that you once suited up for. It’s a scenario that Edmonton sports fans know well, with the hockey team that’s been a stop away on the LRT providing a perfect example.
There may be no sporting city in Canada that embraces its past the way that Edmonton does. When you look at that history of success, you can see why so many of the people who have run these organizations look back when it’s time to look forward.
Between 1978 and 1990, Edmonton was home to six Grey Cup-winning teams and of course five Stanley Cup-winning teams. A City of Champions sign greeted you as you drove into town. You were showered with greatness whenever you turned on your TV. Warren Moon. Wayne Gretzky. Hugh Campbell. Glen Sather. And that’s just the tip of an iceberg of legends. For a history-making 12-year run, you could argue that just about every single day in that span was a glory day in Edmonton. And then, kind of like it did for Hervey, things went a little sideways.
The Oilers have played in a pair of Game 7s of the Stanley Cup Final in the last 34 years (including in 2024) and fallen short. The Elks last raised the Grey Cup nine years ago and if you’ve seen their decline through this decade, you know that the days of being able to claim being the flagship franchise of the league have slipped away from them.
Under Thompson’s still-new ownership, his rebooted franchise is deploying a familiar strategy. He hired Chris Morris as president and CEO — a member of three Grey Cup-winning squads as a player — who in quick turn has hired Hervey back as the GM. Rumours that the freshly let-go Rick Campbell could step in as head coach make a lot of sense in the moment; as would the addition of longtime Lions’ offensive coordinator Jordan Maksymic, who grew up in nearby St. Albert.
Hervey didn’t hold back in his introductory press conference on Wednesday, displaying that familiar fiery passion he brought to the job when he was hired for it in 2013. He used the words laughing stock when describing the team’s perception over the last few years. He said that he sees the empty seats at Commonwealth Stadium as a fan protest; fix it up or we won’t come back.
Hope is the oxygen that any sports franchise and its fans need to coexist together. It’s been largely sucked out of that relationship over the last few years with the Elks. With Hervey’s return, with Morris’ presence and their strong words on Wednesday, it feels like there’s a pulse where there hasn’t been one for a long time.
Three days after the 111th Grey Cup was lifted by the Toronto Argonauts, the Elks have made waves, already pulling our attention to the brand-new off-season. There’s a lot of work — all of it, essentially — still in front of Hervey and the Elks, but they’ve taken those first steps to rebuilding an identity and the success that fans in Edmonton have grown nostalgic for.
