{"id":562986,"date":"2026-03-26T22:19:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T22:19:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/562986\/"},"modified":"2026-03-26T22:19:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T22:19:09","slug":"cfl-combine-week-vaccaros-stock-climbing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/562986\/","title":{"rendered":"CFL Combine Week | Vaccaro’s stock climbing"},"content":{"rendered":"

EDMONTON \u2014 Gio Vaccaro is about to become a very, very popular man. And the evidence of that was already visible to anyone who put eyeballs on him as soon as he arrived here for the Canadian Football League Draft Combine.<\/p>\n

One moment the Winnipeg product is on the phone conducting an interview with The Canadian Press and the next he\u2019s sitting down for a one-on-one with yours truly \u2014 an early start to what will be a ton of conversations the 6-3, 315-pound offensive lineman will have over the weekend.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a growing buzz about Vaccaro, you see, so much so that the Purdue University\/University of Manitoba product is likely have his name called out early when the CFL Draft goes on April 28th \u2014 perhaps as early as first overall.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t worry or think about that stuff at all,\u201d said Vaccaro in a wide-ranging chat. \u201cIf I go first round, second round, third round, eighth round, it doesn\u2019t matter. I\u2019ll just be grateful for any opportunity. I don\u2019t like getting ahead of myself.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe big thing for me really is day by day. I don\u2019t want to look into the future. If I\u2019m the best version of myself every day and keep stacking those days, then the day will come that maybe an organization decides to take me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vaccaro\u2019s stock has skyrocketed lately because of his experience playing tackle, guard and centre at Manitoba and Purdue and his recent testing numbers at the Boilermakers\u2019 Pro Day. He banged out 28 reps of the 225-pound bench press, ran a solid 5.38 40-yard dash and scored well in the other tests.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

UM photos courtesy Zachary Peters<\/p>\n

Asked to do a self-scout \u2014 and CFL coaches will adore this answer \u2014 he offered this:<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a humble guy. Good leader. I love to hype up my teammates. And then on the football field, I\u2019m a mauler. I love finishing guys and the strong part of my game is my run blocking.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vaccaro\u2019s path to potentially being a first-round pick is a fascinating one. His dad Angelo works in the flooring business while Lisa, his mom, works in the senior care field. And it should be said his older brother Mateo is the one who really turned him on to football.<\/p>\n

Gio, it turns out, didn\u2019t pull on a helmet and shoulder pads for real until Grade 9 at St. Paul\u2019s High School after spending the previous 13 years in hockey as a centre.<\/p>\n

A really, really big centre.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was a big guy, and I played down the middle which, yes, was a bit weird,\u201d he said with a grin.<\/p>\n

By the time he reached Grade 9 he had a decision \u2014 head to Shaftesbury High School to play hockey or join his brother at St. Paul\u2019s and attempt to crack the football team as a newbie to the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was my brother who talked me into playing,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd when I started, I wasn\u2019t very good. I played D-line, I played O-line, hopping back in forth.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did not know a single thing about football other than watching my brother. I guess some of my athleticism from hockey transferred over to football \u2014 I\u2019d like to say that, at least \u2014 but I learned a lot from my older brother. I wouldn\u2019t say I was very good at all. It was the opposite.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen in my Grade 10 year I played O-line and it was like a switch was flipped. I made the varsity team, and my brother was in his senior year, and I got to play alongside him.\u201d<\/p>\n

The same thing would happen a few years later with the Bisons, albeit after a year in Florida at the Clearwater Academy. Vaccaro lost his senior year at St. Paul\u2019s due to the COVID-19 pandemic and landed down south after Jesse Chincar, the head coach there, came across a post on his social media account.<\/p>\n

\u201cCoach Jesse, he found me on Twitter,\u201d said Vaccaro. \u201cI was posting a couple of workouts on Twitter and trying to get U Sports offers and he saw it and reached out to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Vaccaro was part of a state championship winning team in Clearwater and then returned to Manitoba to play for Brian Dobie and alongside his brother.<\/p>\n

What happened next is now part of Bison football folklore as Vaccaro started at left tackle as a freshman \u2014 the first in Dobie\u2019s 29-year coaching career \u2014 and then moved inside to left guard for his sophomore season, where he was named an All-Canadian.<\/p>\n

He took it one step further in 2024 by being named All-Canadian again AND capturing the JP Metras Award as the top lineman in the country \u2013 becoming just the second OL in Manitoba history to grab those honours and the first since Bart Evans in 1974.<\/p>\n

He was also the first Bison since Chris Bochen in 2001-02 to to be named a back-to-back Canada West All-Star and First Team All-Canadian.<\/p>\n

He then moved to Purdue, calling the decision to leave the Bisons one of the most difficult in his life.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a 7-1 team, and it was Coach Dobie\u2019s last year,\u201d he said. \u201cWe were building something truly special and so to leave that program and move on was really hard. I was there for three years and had great teammates.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I also felt that maybe I had exhausted all my options there. I relied on my agent\u2019s experience, asked him a bunch of questions, and when I had the opportunity to go down south to Purdue when they offered me a scholarship it was a no brainer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vaccaro spent much of last year on the Boilermakers\u2019 special teams units but did get a ton of work in a game against eventual national champion Indiana \u2014 a performance he felt was pivotal to prove to himself he could compete at that level.<\/p>\n

All of this brings us back to this weekend. The Blue Bombers would be thrilled if Vaccaro was still available when they make their first selection, fourth overall, but the chatter seems to indicate he could go to Ottawa, Toronto or Edmonton with one of the first three picks.<\/p>\n

\u201cI grew up a Bomber fan,\u201d he said. \u201cEven though I was playing hockey for a long time, I watched a lot of games with my brother at Investors Group Field, now Princess Auto Stadium.<\/p>\n

\u201cGrowing up watching guys like Collin Kornelson, AK Gassama go to their hometown team\u2026 that was surreal. Growing up around the Bombers, it would be cool if it could happen but I\u2019ll be happy to play anywhere. This has been my dream for awhile now.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EDMONTON \u2014 Gio Vaccaro is about to become a very, very popular man. And the evidence of that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":562987,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":["post-562986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cfl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canadian-football-league","tag-canadianfootballleague","tag-cfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/562986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=562986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/562986\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/562987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=562986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=562986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=562986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}