The Queen’s Golden Gaels football team is looking for a new head coach after Pat Sheahan announced his resignation on Tuesday.

His resignation comes after a disappointing season in which the Golden Gaels went 3-5 and missed the Ontario University Athletics playoffs.

Four of the Gaels’ five losses this season were by less than a touchdown, and one of those losses came in overtime.

Sheahan leaves Queen’s with an impressive record amassed over a 30-year university football coaching career, 19 of which were with Queen’s, including a Vanier Cup in 2009.

Sheahan ranks fifth all-time in U Sports coaching wins, was OUA coach of the year in 2001, 2007 and 2008, and received the Frank Tindall Trophy (named after the legendary Queen’s coach) as U Sports coach of the year in 2008. He had been the longest-serving active coach in Canadian university football. Sheahan came to Queen’s in 1999 after coaching at Concordia University in Montreal.

“It has been an honour to lead this team, and hundreds of talented student-athletes, for the past 19 years,” Sheahan said in a statement. “I am incredibly proud of all we accomplished during my time at Queen’s, highlighted by our 2009 Vanier Cup win and the 2016 opening of the new Richardson Stadium. I have also had the privilege of working with dozens of dedicated coaches over the years, and know we could not have achieved the successes we did without each and every one of them.”

A national search will start immediately for Sheahan’s successor.

“Pat Sheahan has been a tremendous ambassador for the university and a respected and celebrated coach who has led our team to remarkable achievements,” Leslie Dal Cin, executive director, Queen’s Athletics and Recreation, said in a statement. “His contributions to our program are immeasurable, and as a result he has cemented his place in Queen’s and U Sports history as one of the most accomplished Canadian university football coaches of all time.”

Some of Sheahan’s career highlights include 156 career regular season and playoff wins, three Yates Cup (OUA championship) appearances with Queen’s in 2002, 2009 and 2013, and he has helped develop 25 Queen’s players who have been Canadian Football League draft picks.

“Pat has also been instrumental as a role model and counsellor to his student-athletes, who have succeeded on the field as Gaels as well as off the field after they graduated,” Dal Cin said. “We are incredibly grateful for his years of dedication to Gaels football.”

Sheahan is also a member of an exclusive group at Queen’s. He, Tindall and Doug Hargreaves are the only Queen’s football coaches in history to reach 100 regular season and playoff wins with the Golden Gaels.

Sheahan will stay as an adviser to the athletics department until June.

imacalpine@postmedia.com

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