Williamson Receives CJFL Special Teams Player of the Year Award

London Beefeaters Kicker and Punter AJ Williamson is the 2022 Canadian Junior Football League’s Special Teams Player of the Year. Williamson received the award in Regina at the CJFL’s Canadian Bowl awards banquet.

Williamson’s stats in his first season with the Beefeaters were impressive, kicking a CJFL high 19 field goals, the longest from 49 yards.  He was nearly perfect in extra point conversions, making 21/22 attempts. As for punting, Williamson earned 4 singles on his 49 punts which averaged 33.6 net yards. Willamson’s longest punt was a booming 76 yard kick on the road against the GTA Grizzlies. In total, Williamson’s kicks resulted in a CJFL best 90 points in the regular season.

The CJFL award was the latest in a long list of personal accolades that the West Ferris Secondary School of North Bay alumni received this year. Williamson was named the CJFL’s 1st Team All-Canadian Kicker and the 2nd Team All-Canadian Punter.

He is the OFC’s Alex Stajic Special Teams Player of the Year and was the unanimous selection for the OFC All-Star at the kicker and punter positions. He was also named the OFC’s Special Teams Player fo the Week for week 8 of the regular season. Williamson was also recognized at the Beefeaters end of year team banquet as team MVP and the Special Teams Player of the Year.  His 19 made field goals also set a new team record.

When asked if he has had a chance to reflect on his impressive season Williamson says that it all happened so quickly. “It’s gone by really fast, it felt like a snap of the fingers and the season was over but it was a lot of fun and I’m still reflecting on it.”

In the off season Williamson trained with Western Mustangs kicking legend and now Kicking Coach Darryl Wheeler.  During Wheeler’s time as a Mustang from 2008-2011, he was a named to the 2nd team All-Canadian punter twice, and was the named the 1st team OUA punting All-Star twice. Wheeler also holds the U Sports playoff record and co-owns the Mustang record for field goals in a game with 6, and kicked a record 22 field goals in a playoff season. Wheeler signed with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in 2008 out of Utah State University and attended training camp before coming to Western in 2008.

Williamson says that Wheeler’s knowledge of the kicking game is extensive. “He’s just been in the game for so long and everything that I’ve learned is from him. Training with him at Western and then coming to the Beefeaters he really did a lot for me.”

Willamson’s Beefeaters finished the regular season in second place with a 6-2 record. They defeated the Ottawa Sooners in the semifinals to advance to the OFC Final, where they lost to the OFC Champion St. Clair Saints.

As this was Williamson’s first season with the team, he admits that he didn’t know many of his teammates when the year started, but that changed as the weeks went on. “That’s when I started to get to know more of the guys and they’re all like family.  We’ve been hanging out a lot more and we want to keep hanging out…I really love all of the guys and they’re a great group that’s for sure.”

Left to right: Beefeaters OL Kevin Ricard with his CJFL Past Commissioners Award, Aj Williamson with his  CJFL Special Teams Player of the Year)

Williamson was in Regina for the awards banquet and also was in attendance at the Canadian Bowl which saw the Okanagan Sun defeat the Regina Thunder 21-19 to win the national title.

Williamson said that experiencing the weekend festivities was great and that it’s given him some added motivation to return next year with his Beefeaters teammates as participants in the game. “Of course you want to have all of your boys playing beside you, especially for hardware (the Canadian Bowl). Hopefully we can come back next year and put a dent in the league.”

Left to right: London Team President Rob Annen, OL Kevin Ricard, AJ Williamson, London Team Administrator. Jen Annen) 

Williamson’s regular season stats are below.
 

Field Goals:
FG TRIED : 25
MADE: 19
FG YDS: 560
LONG: 49
PTS: 90
FG %: 76
S: 12
CONV: 21/22

Kickoff:
KO GR YDS: 1,926
GR YDS AVG: 56.6
NET YDS: 1,350
NET AVG: 39.7
LONG: 69
S: 3

Punting:
PUNTS: 49
GRS YDS: 1,865
GR AVG: 38.1
NET YDS: 1,645
NET AVG: 33.6
LONG: 76
S: 4

POW: Week 8