CIS 50th Anniversary Success Stories (Week 7): Mark Lee

As part of its 50th Anniversary Celebration, Canadian Interuniversity Sport presents the CIS 50th Anniversary Success Stories series. Each Thursday throughout the 2011-12 season, we will profile two alumni from CIS member institutions who have made outstanding contributions in areas such as sports, business, politics or in the community.

Carleton football veteran turned national sports reporter

Mark Lee once called plays for the Ravens, now he calls plays for Hockey Night in Canada

By Sarah Jean Maher

OTTAWA – Carleton alumnus Mark Lee has come a long way since being a Ravens quarterback.  Now a long-time national sports reporter for CBC, the CIS veteran has accomplished a lot, both on camera and on the field, and says he is one of many “Old Crows” looking forward to the return of football at the school.  

Lee played quarterback for the Ravens football team for four years, graduating with a Bachelor of Journalism in 1980. 

“It was a great experience to development a camaraderie with teammates and build friendships that last to this day,” says Lee.

After a few rebuilding years at the beginning of Lee’s Carleton career, the Ravens were among the better teams in Ontario and Quebec. In his third season, he remembers losing a playoff game to eventual Vanier Cup winners, Queen’s University, in double overtime.

“We should have won that game in regulation time,” says Lee.  “That loss still haunts most of us.  [It’s] a reminder of how close we were.”

Some of Lee’s best memories as a Raven are of winning the annual Panda Game against the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees. 

“The build up in the media was big, lots of newspaper stories and pictures,” he recalls. “The cross-town rivalry with uOttawa was huge. The atmosphere on campus was electric.  It was a wild party in the stands.  On the field, the level of competition was even more intense.”

Lee says he considered coming back for a fifth year with the Ravens, as the team was doing well and most of the veterans were returning.  However, CFCF in Montreal offered him a job and Lee turned down another year at Carleton, as well as offers from the Canadian Football League, to pursue his career in journalism. 

Although the decision to leave the CIS and focus on his career was a difficult one, Lee believes it was for the best.  Within a year of working as a news anchor in Montreal, he received an offer to work for CBC Radio in Toronto. 

While working for CBC, Lee became host of The Inside Track, a sports documentary series.  His documentary reporting won him two Actra Awards as Best Sportscaster.  In 1994, he also won a Gemini Award for The Spirit of the Game, a three-part documentary on hockey. 

Lee later reported on the International Olympic Bribery Scandal in 1999 for The National Magazine, as well as the 2005 Grey Cup.  He has also covered a variety of sports, including cycling, women’s hockey, and beach and indoor volleyball at several Olympic and Pan Am Games. 

Lee currently does the Western Conference play-by-play for Hockey Night in Canada every Saturday night.   

“I have been [at CBC] for 31 years and have had the opportunity to work on so many gratifying projects in both radio and TV,” he says. 

Lee credits most of his success to his father, Bill, who passed away last year.  Bill had worked in broadcasting as well, and was a well-known radio personality in Ottawa. 

“I learned the craft of broadcasting from him and began a fledgling radio career in high school, well before I got to Carleton,” says Lee. “He taught me to pay my dues, and by that, he meant there are no shortcuts to success. Well before Malcolm Gladwell wrote about ‘Outliers’ and the 10,000 hours that make someone good at what they do, my father was always reminding me of the work it takes to be successful.”