In conjunction with the CFL Combine, Riderville.com is profiling the four attendees from Saskatchewan-based university teams. The four-part series concludes today with a story on University of Regina Rams defensive back Carson Sombach.<\/p>\n
There is an automatic association with football when you think of quarterback, running back, defensive back and, adhering to the rhyme scheme, Sombach.<\/p>\n
Regina-born Carson Sombach is representing the University of Regina Rams \u2014 a team that also included three of his brothers in 2023 and 2024 \u2014 at the CFL Combine, which concludes today in Edmonton.<\/p>\n
Carson\u2019s older brother, Jackson, attended the 2024 Combine before being drafted by the Calgary Stampeders.<\/p>\n
Carson hopes to parlay a strong showing at the Combine into his own career in professional football.<\/p>\n
The two youngest Sombachs \u2014\u00a0twins Rylar and Connor \u2014\u00a0are currently on the Rams\u2019 roster. They are, like Carson and Jackson, defensive backs.<\/p>\n
The Sombachs all played for the Regina Intercollegiate Football League\u2019s Miller Marauders before proceeding to the Canada West ranks.<\/p>\n
Their father (Steve) and uncle (Mark) also excelled for Miller before joining the Rams, who were then a junior football powerhouse.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we were young and my dad was coaching at Miller, he would take me and all my little brothers to Miller football practice,\u201d Carson recalled. \u201cWe\u2019d be watching the drills, watching practice, and we\u2019d be on the sidelines for every game.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were the rabbits for pursuit drills. Then we started playing football as soon as we possibly could and we fell in love with it.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery Christmas, we got our own little plastic helmets and our jerseys. We\u2019d play tackle football in the yard. So it has been football ever since I was born.\u201d<\/p>\n
Matt Sombach, the oldest of Steve and Heather\u2019s five sons, focused on basketball. His four siblings concentrated on football, taking after their father.<\/p>\n
Steve was an offensive lineman on a high-powered Rams offence. His brother, Mark, was a running back in the junior ranks. But the gridiron lineage goes back even further.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy grandpa (Raymond Sombach) went into the Navy and he played football for them back in the day,\u201d Carson said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had always been a big hockey family. My great uncle (Frank Wappel) played for the Regina Pats and another great uncle (Gord Wappel) played for the Pats and in the NHL.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy dad and my uncle had never played football until about Grade 10 or Grade 11. My dad made this AAA (hockey team). My grandpa picked up the phone and said, \u2018Oh, you made the team?\u2019 Then all my dad heard my grandpa say was, \u2018How much?!\u2019<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s just say that the hockey career did not go into overtime.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy dad and my uncle started playing football then and went on to play for the Rams,\u201d Carson continued. \u201cThey fell in love with it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like father, like sons.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe did some damage to the basement, for sure,\u201d Carson said with a laugh. \u201cWe had one of those Little Tikes basketball nets and we would play tackle basketball down in the basement, so there were a lot of holes in the wall. We just hid them with the piano.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose holes stayed there for about eight years, until we grew up and stopped playing in the basement. Then my dad fixed the holes in the wall. He said, \u2018I\u2019m not going to fix them if you\u2019re just going to put holes in the wall again.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019d also go outside to play tackle football right after it rained. We\u2019d do something we called the Running Back Game. We\u2019d all put our plastic helmets on in the front yard. One person was the running back and there were three defenders.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019d all pick our favourite players. I\u2019d be Reggie Bush. Jackson would be Steven Jackson. Rylar would be Chris Johnson. We\u2019d put cones out in the yard and we\u2019d count stats. We\u2019d count how many touchdowns we scored and how many yards we gained.\u201d<\/p>\n
How about 109 yards?<\/p>\n
That was the distance of Carson\u2019s interception-return touchdown against the visiting University of Alberta Golden Bears on Sept. 5. The long-distance pick-six was the punctuation mark as the Rams won 47-23.<\/p>\n
The 5-foot-9 1\/2, 191-pound safety had two interceptions and 10 pass knockdowns last season en route to earning Canada West all-star and second-team All-Canadian laurels.<\/p>\n
The year before, one of his two picks was returned for a 46-yard major. That TD proved to be the game winner as the Rams defeated the host University of Saskatchewan Huskies 19-14 in the Hardy Cup \u2014\u00a0the Canada West championship game.<\/p>\n
Earlier in the contest, a Jackson Sombach interception had set up a Rams touchdown. Jackson was named the Rams\u2019 Most Valuable Player after the 2024 season.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s awesome how we\u2019ve all progressed,\u201d Carson said. \u201cIt has all led to this point.<\/p>\n
\u201cHaving Jackson, especially, go through it all and almost lead the way, in a sense, and have us all be super close and go through the same things together, it has been nice to have that success in the family.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn the Rams, when you\u2019re going to practice or you see one of your brothers get an interception or something like that, it\u2019s always a super-cool moment. It\u2019s always nice to have family success as well as team success.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s especially nice when you put it all together.\u201d<\/p>\n
With 82 of the CFL\u2019s top Draft prospects all together in Edmonton, Carson left for the Alberta capital with the objective of impressing the talent evaluators.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just want to show them that I can play football and that I have a good football IQ and that I\u2019m physical,\u201d he said. \u201cI want to play my brand of football and show them what I can do and how I can do it at a high level.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sombach and offensive lineman Ethan Graham<\/a> are carrying the Rams\u2019 colours at the Combine, which is presented by Anytime Fitness.<\/p>\n The University of Saskatchewan Huskies are represented by defensive lineman Charlie Parks<\/a> and offensive lineman Jack Warrack.<\/a><\/p>\n (The Saskatchewan Roughrider Foundation supports all elite football in Saskatchewan.)<\/p>\n \u2022 PHOTO CREDIT: Piper Sports Photography<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In conjunction with the CFL Combine, Riderville.com is profiling the four attendees from Saskatchewan-based university teams. The four-part…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":569123,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":["post-569122","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\/569122","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=569122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569122\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/569123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=569122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=569122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=569122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}