{"id":682734,"date":"2026-05-20T21:11:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T21:11:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/682734\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T21:11:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T21:11:10","slug":"alicia-gladue-finding-her-coaching-path-through-cfl-women-in-football-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/682734\/","title":{"rendered":"Alicia Gladue finding her coaching path through CFL Women in Football Program"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back in Grade 8, Alicia Gladue worked as a photographer\/social media coordinator for the Fort McKay Northern Spirits.<\/p>\n

During a game near the end of the season, with a short bench, coach Dylan Elias begged the teenager to put the phone down and go into the game as a player.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy coach was like, \u2018Can you go in?\u2019 and I was like, \u2018Heck no,\u2019\u201d Gladue recalled this week over the phone from BC Lions training camp, where she is working with the team\u2019s coaching staff. \u201cHe said, \u2018We need you to go in, please, please.\u2019 One player stormed off to the locker room. I was like, \u2018You go back on and I\u2019ll go with you.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI went in knowing nothing, and they just told me to tackle the player with the ball. I did and, ever since then,\u00a0I\u2019ve loved it.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the time, Elias simply wanted to avoid forfeiting the game. He had no idea if Gladue even knew where to stand on the field.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/p>\n

Alicia Gladue is the Lions\u2019 Women in Football Program participant at this year\u2019s training camp (BCLions.com)<\/p>\n

But the moments that change lives tend to happen when we least expect them. And in that moment, Gladue \u2014 who grew up on the Fort McKay First Nation along the banks of the Athabasca River about 500 kilometres north of Edmonton \u2014\u00a0 figures she found her place in this world.<\/p>\n

\u201cI realized she didn\u2019t have any fear,\u201d Elias said. \u201cShe was a little girl, but she showed up big. She went toe-to-toe with some of these big Grade 10 boys playing running back.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s relentless. She is fearless, and she always tries to get better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Seven years later, that drive to get better led Gladue to apply for the CFL\u2019s Women in Football Program presented by KPMG.<\/p>\n

Gladue was selected as the BC Lions\u2019 participant in this year\u2019s program, which places women with CFL clubs during training camp to gain experience in football operations and coaching.<\/p>\n

Now 20, Gladue is spending training camp with the Lions in Kamloops, working with linebackers coach Mark Washington and defensive coordinator Mike Benevides. The days are long, with early wake-ups, meetings, practices, game-planning and film review before finally getting back to her room each night around 9:30 p.m.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone was super welcoming,\u201d Gladue said of her first day on the job. \u201cI\u00a0had a little bit of imposter syndrome, but after a while I was like, \u2018Oh, this is so possible.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the beginning I was like, \u2018Oh my God, this is so crazy,\u2019 but the coaches are normal people, just like me.\u201d<\/p>\n

They\u2019re normal people who share Gladue\u2019s love for the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cFootball changed my life,\u201d she said. \u201cI was smoking and drinking at a young age. It\u2019s super easy to become a product of your environment, and football gave me a purpose and something to work towards, which took me away from the smoking and drinking.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gladue still plays football as a middle linebacker for the Arctic Pride, an Edmonton-based team in the Western Women\u2019s Canadian Football League. She\u2019s also come full circle with the Fort McKay program, where she serves as the special teams coordinator and linebackers coach for the Northern Spirits.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Gladue will be with the BC Lions throughout training camp (BCLions.com)<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s had a lot of coaching opportunities \u2014 she coached the provincial Indigenous boys\u2019 high school team,\u201d\u00a0said Elias,\u00a0who met Gladue when he worked at the youth centre on the Fort McKay First Nation. \u201cThe only thing I can do is offer moments and opportunities. A lot of the kids I\u2019ve seen throughout the years have had the same access to opportunities as Alicia, but not everyone is able to actually take those opportunities and make them into something.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe really took everything that was available to her and turned it into something special. She\u2019s kind of been a trailblazer, I guess that\u2019s the word, for a lot of kids who came after her.\u201d<\/p>\n

To that end, Gladue serves as a billet mom for the Northern Spirits.<\/p>\n

\u201cI take care of four girls, taking them to school, making food, being a ride whenever they need for appointments and stuff like that,\u201d she said. \u201cI want to give back. That\u2019s what drives me to hopefully change somebody\u2019s life, even if it\u2019s for one year. Planting these little seeds, that\u2019s what\u2019s most important.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elias sees big things ahead for Gladue \u2014 including the possibility of playing professionally overseas and building on her experience with the Lions to climb the coaching ranks in Canada.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But in the long run, Gladue knows where her heart lies.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf it\u2019s coaching, if it\u2019s public speaking, if it\u2019s mentoring \u2014 any of those, I think they would be great,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be something around helping Indigenous youth, because that\u2019s what gives me drive.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s what makes me happy.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Back in Grade 8, Alicia Gladue worked as a photographer\/social media coordinator for the Fort McKay Northern Spirits.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":682735,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":["post-682734","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\/682734","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=682734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682734\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/682735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=682734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=682734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=682734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}