Wall of Distinction 2025: Badminton star Humble won MacEwan's first national championship

Jefferson Hagen
MacEwan Athletics

This is the second of three features on the inductees into the MacEwan Griffins' 2025 Wall of Distinction class, who will be celebrated at the department's annual Awards Gala on Saturday.

WEDNESDAY: Jordan Steinke, curling (2011-15)

TODAY: Áine Humble, badminton (1987-89) 

EDMONTON – Although Áine Humble's induction into the MacEwan Athletics Wall of Distinction this Saturday comes 37 years after her career highlight with the Griffins, the timing couldn't be more perfect.

The former Griffins badminton star – who holds the distinction of being the first MacEwan student-athlete to win a national championship (in 1988) – has not only recently retired from her involvement in the sport as an umpire, but she's also set to retire from her career as a family studies and gerontology professor at Halifax's Mount Saint Vincent University this year.

So, when they talk about life coming full circle, this is it. 

Being celebrated at the annual MacEwan Athletics banquet on April 5 as part of the 2025 Wall of Distinction induction class sews it all up nicely for Humble.

"It was a delightful surprise," said Humble of receiving the phone call from MacEwan Athletics Director Joel Mrak. "It felt very special to be asked and recognized in that way. 

"It was a pretty big deal back in the day to get a gold medal for this little community college. I was lucky to be the first one because there were a number that followed pretty quickly. It feels really lovely to have that accomplishment recognized.

"I'm actually at the end of my career – I'm retiring in three months – so it feels really cool to pull that in at the tail end. Grant MacEwan was the very first post-secondary institution I attended, as well."

Humble headed to the 1987-88 CCAA badminton championship as an accomplished player who had combined with twin brother David Humble to win three U16 and U19 national titles out of the Edmonton Derrick Golf and Winter Club. It quickly became apparent she wouldn't be beaten.

"I was the strongest female player there by far," she told MacEwan Athletics in a 2021 interview. "Every person I played leading into the final – in those days in was a best two out of three games and you played up to 11 – I won every match in two games. It never went to three. And in every match, one game was 11-0."

That earned her a nickname.

"My teammates were calling me the Bagel Girl or Bagel Queen," she said. "We actually have a photograph of all of us holding up bagels because of this. It was pretty funny."

Áine Humble (middle row second from left) and her ACAC teammates hold up bagels to signify holding an opponent scoreless during the 1988 CCAA nationals (Courtesy, Áine Humble).

Humble's victory over Fanshawe's Penny Scott in the 1988 women's singles CCAA final gave her MacEwan's first national title – individual or team. 

In the years since, 11 more CCAA individual gold medals were won by Griffins student-athletes, including another one by Humble, who won the 1989 CCAA women's doubles championship with Carlyn Ching.

READ HER 'WHERE ARE THEY NOW' ALUMNI FEATURE FROM 2021 HERE

"I remember being very excited to win the gold medal and it occurred in Sydney, N.S., and I ended up living in Nova Scotia for most of my adult life, so that was kind of fun," said Humble. 

"At the CCAA nationals, there was a team event and also an individual event. That first year I competed, our Alberta team, I believe, got the bronze medal. I always just really enjoyed competing as part of a team because my previous badminton experiences to that – 99 per cent of them – had only been individual competition, so I really appreciated the camaraderie and support of playing as part of a team, even though it's ultimately just you on the court – it's not like basketball or volleyball. 

"My team members were always super supportive of me when I was playing. Then it moved into the individual competition, and they continued to be really supportive."

In 1989, Humble helped Alberta win a gold medal in the team competition.

That was her last season at MacEwan, and she was named Griffins Female Athlete of the Year, an honour she didn't receive in 1988, despite the historic accomplishment.

Áine Humble, left, poses with Griffins head coach Alan Thom after winning the badminton team's MVP award in 1988. A year later, she was named MacEwan's Female Athlete of the Year (file photo).

"I think they were pretty pleased about it," she said of the institution's first national championship. "I was recognized at the Athletics awards banquet. But they did not give me Athlete of the Year. I feel they didn't give it to me because they had given that award to a badminton player the year before and they weren't going to give it to a badminton player a second year in a row.  There was also a talented female basketball player who was graduating that year that they wanted to recognize."

Truth be told, badminton players could have had a stranglehold on the award. Over a 12-year span from 1988-2000 under head coach Alan Thom, MacEwan's badminton squad was a dynasty, winning 21 individual medals at CCAA championships, boasting 15 CCAA All Canadians (two of them belonging to Humble) and capturing 24 ACAC individual championships.

And Humble was at the start of all of it. She will be the second Griffins badminton team member inducted into the Wall of Distinction, following Wen Wang, who won three-straight CCAA men's singles championships while studying at MacEwan from 1988-91.

"It was very exciting to have this really strong team of players at Grant MacEwan," said Humble. "I'd like to think it made people sit up and notice us a little bit more because badminton is not quite a dominant sport in the ways volleyball, basketball or soccer might be. The players that came after me were phenomenal players. They were from other countries where badminton is huge, so they were extremely talented players that the university was lucky to get."

MacEwan's 1988-89 badminton team featured three national champions, four CCAA All Canadians and multiple ACAC medalists. Áine Humble is seated next to the trophies (file photo).

After finishing the Early Childhood development program at MacEwan in 1989, Humble focused on academic pursuits, ultimately getting her PhD in Human Development and Family Studies with a minor in Women Studies from Oregon State University in 2003.

Badminton, a sport she'd had so much success in, but one that also included challenges, such as struggling with the mental fortitude needed to play at a high level, was put on ice. Humble didn't play at all in the years after MacEwan, eventually giving away her racquets.

"I set it aside for a long time," she said of what turned out to be a 17-year hiatus from the sport. "I didn't play badminton. A lot of it was I couldn't find a place to play at because I wasn't a member of a private club anymore where I was going to school. So, I set it aside for a long time and I thought I was done with it. At one point, I moved a couple of times and still brought my badminton racquets with me. When I was 28, I just gave them away. I thought, 'I'm never playing again. What's the point in taking these with me.' "

But one day, her brother David, who represented Canada at the 1992 OIympics, called and urged her to join him in mixed doubles competition at the masters level.

What resulted was five national silver medals and another gold to go along with the six national titles she won in her prime as a junior and Griffins athlete.

In the final tournament she played in 2012, Áine Humble (second from left) celebrates her seventh and final national badminton title in the Ladies Doubles 45 and Over division at the Canadian Masters championships (Courtesy, Áine Humble).

"I surprised myself by coming out of retirement at age 39," said Humble. "I'm really happy I came back to it. And then I got involved with umpiring. I'm really happy I was able to write a different ending for my badminton career."

Humble recently retired from a 13-year badminton umpiring career, which included both the CCAA Championship and Canadian University/College Championships – the latter being her final event held last month in Quebec City.

Throughout her badminton journey, Humble learned life lessons that have remained with her to this day.

"I think like any sport people play, they learn to work hard, to achieve something," she said. "They learn about the type of effort it takes to do well. They learn mental toughness from not only the training and competing, but they also learn mental toughness through the defeats and how to manage those. I think badminton, over the years, I always took that with me in the future. 

"I always valued sport and just being physically fit was very important to maintain that. I think it's encouraged me to be a little bit competitive throughout my life. But that's gotten lighter over time – a healthy level of competition, let's say."

And so, it all comes full circle now for Humble, all of the ups and downs led her to this moment, where she'll be enshrined in the Griffins' Wall of Distinction.

"There were challenging parts to my badminton career and then there were some high points," she said. "I stepped away for a long period of time, but I'm really glad I came back and was able to write a new ending and just look at my whole experience with competitive sport in a very positive light.

"(The Wall of Distinction honour) really does feel like the cherry on top."