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November 1, 2010
BC Hydro teaches an old kicker new tricks
Posted by Rob Klovance
There were times in the 1990s at BC Place Stadium when a few "Looo Birds" became "Boo Birds", adoring fans temporarily losing the faith as an aging Lui Passaglia missed the occasional very makeable field goal for the BC Lions.
But Lui hardly noticed, kept on kicking well, and – to the delight of his fans and the reporters who covered him – went out with a bang and a chorus of loving "Looos". At 46, Passaglia set a Canadian Football League record by making 40 of 44 field goal attempts (a 90.9% success rate) over the course of the season.
He also won a third Grey Cup championship with the Lions. And with that, he retired from football.
"Age was never a consideration of mine. I loved playing the game, so I did whatever I had to do to stay in shape and get the most out of my potential," says Passaglia when asked about his performance at 46. "Whenever I went out there to kick I felt in my mind, like I was kicking them when I was 22."
At an incredible 25 seasons, Passaglia's professional football career lasted almost as long as the Coquitlam home he just demolished this fall. The man who scored more points than anyone else in football history – at 3,991, not counting playoffs – is now focussed on developing a few homes, including a new one for he and wife Loa that will include radiant, in-floor heating he believes will pay off in reduced energy consumption.
"Radiant heating is much better, because there are more [heating] zones," he says. "You don't have to crank up the heat in the rooms you're not using. Now you control the amount of energy that's being spent."
A Team Power Smart Leader whose No. 5 B.C. Lions jersey is part of November's Team Power Smart Contest prize package, Passaglia doesn't pretend for a moment that he was an early adopter of energy-efficient behaviour. But since joining the team a few years ago, he has become far more mindful of home energy use and the little things he can do to be smart with his power.
And he figures that if he can do it, there's no reason British Columbians can't get their act together enough to meet the new Clean Energy Act goal of off-setting, through conservation, 66% of the expected electricity demand increase in B.C. by 2020.
"Once I got on board with Power Smart, I learned little things like turning off lights in the house," he says. "Before, I never really thought about it. But all of a sudden I'm telling my kids and my wife 'Hey, shut off the lights!.' Once you get it in people minds, it becomes habitual."
Passaglia grew up in East Vancouver as the son of immigrant parents who paid little attention to energy efficiency but who, in their own way, got more than a few things right.
"Everyone had a clothesline out back – there was no such thing as dryers in those days," he recalls "The laundry was outside on sunny and warm days, and in the basement when it was raining or cold."
From Lou to Lui to Luongo
As a B.C. Lion, Passaglia said he always loved to hear the fans' "Loooo" chorus, first at Empire Stadium and then at BC Place. But he never thought of it as just his own, so feels no animosity whatsoever that the cheer is now used by Vancouver Canucks fans as a way of cheering goaltender Roberto Luongo.
"I had an inkling that would happen," he says of the cheer's migration to Luongo. " I wasn't the first Lou here anyways. There was Lou Harris, a running back for the Lions. He didn't last very long, but whenever he had a good game the Lou chant would come out for him.
"It just so happened him and I were playing together in 1976, his last year and my first. Once he was cut, I pretty well took it over and it lasted until I finished. Then Roberto came along, and it's his turn to take on the mantle."
Rob Klovance, who once covered Passaglia and the Lions as a Vancouver Sun sports reporter, is managing editor of bchydro.com and a regular contributor to Unplug This Blog!
