In 2022, Elijah Barnes didn’t get to play football on a team as the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions limited how people could get together. 

And yet, it’s the same year Barnes, 19, says he felt his dreams of being a pro football player were within reach.

“We would hop the fences at St. Thomas More [Catholic Secondary School] or go to open fields, public parks, anywhere we could go,” he told CBC Hamilton, detailing how he and a small group of friends would train roughly three hours per day, five days per week.

“I felt like the amount of work I was able to put in, the improvement I was able to see, it felt like I could push this even more and I’m not at my peak.”

Now, he’s among a select group of athletes representing Canada in the 2024 International Federation of American Football (IFAF) World Junior Football Championship in Edmonton, Alta., starting next weekend.

Tournament spokesperson Brian Findlay said the two Canadian teams have 60 players each, 45 of which are expected to play.

One other player, Justin Haynes, is also from Hamilton. In addition, there are six players from McMaster University including Baptiste Tallec, Benjamin Blaise, Benjamin D’Amours, Isaiah Cooper, Jackob Branton and Josh Page.

Findlay said the Canadian teams formed after roughly 100 players from across the country were invited to try out.

The players will face off against players from Austria, Australia, Brazil, Japan, Panama and the U.S.

Canada won gold at the last two tournaments, in 2018 and 2016, and is the only team to have appeared in every gold medal game, Findlay said.

The tournament has been delayed since 2018 due to the pandemic.

‘He can do it all’

Barnes said he played as many sports as he could when he was younger, but always had an affinity for football thanks to his father.

“His influence geared me toward sitting on the couch when I was two-years-old on Sundays and watching the games,” Barnes said.

He said he started to truly realize how much he loved the sport in early 2015, when tears filled his eyes after seeing his favourite National Football League team, the Green Bay Packers, lose to the Seattle Seahawks in the 2014 NFC Championship game.

“The fact I’m upset shows how much I love the game,” he remembers thinking.

Barnes played football at R.A. Riddell Elementary School, St. Thomas More and with Hamilton Junior Tiger-Cats.

The lean, left-handed, 6’5″ athlete eventually went to Canada Prep Academy in Niagara where he played against competition from the U.S.

Barnes just finished his first year at Carleton University in Ottawa.

Josh Sacobie, offensive coordinator at Carleton, said when Barnes first joined the team he “really didn’t blink and picked things up really quickly.

“He can do it all. He’s got a big arm, he’s athletic … he can run, he can read defences and coverages at a pretty high level for a high school kid,” Sacobie said.

“I’m really excited to see what he’ll do and I won’t be surprised with any success he has.”

The IFAF games start on June 22 and the gold medal game is on June 30.