Christina Litz [BA/94, LLB/97] offers up an impressive stat shared by media: the number of Caitlin Clark jerseys bought by fans of the U.S. basketball phenom outsold all of the NFL Dallas Cowboys players combined last season.
“Isn’t that wild?” Litz says.
With the boost in popularity of women’s professional sports—17 million Canadians identified as fans in a 2024 poll—Litz was all in when asked to be president of Canada’s first women’s pro soccer league, the Northern Super League. The UM law grad, also a former staffer of The Manitoban, hadn’t planned for a career in sports but landed executive marketing roles at True North Sports & Entertainment, the Canadian Football League and Woodbine, Canada’s largest horseracing track.
“It was an opportunity to see if I could use my background and passion to help this new league come to life.”
Her take on excelling in the sports industry: “There’s an overemphasis that you need to go to a sports management program to be a sports executive. I actually take a different view of this: Be the best commerce grad you can be. Be the best lawyer you can be. Be the best journalist you can be. I think about the talent I’ve brought in from non-sports fields that has added a different view.”
Why it’s time for a women’s league: “There are over 160 Canadian women playing pro soccer around the world because they don’t have a domestic league to play in. Canada, on the women’s side, has excelled—in a way, more than the men’s side—and a lot of the players—including Diana Matheson and Christine Sinclair and Winnipeg’s own Desiree Scott [BA/16]—are household names. If we as a country want to continue our dominance, we need a league to support that development, that vision.”
(*Scott recently signed with Ottawa Rapid FC, one of the teams that will compete in the Northern Super League’s inaugural season.)
A mantra she values: “If you can see it, you can be it. We’ve had incredible role models at the women’s national team level but we only see them every four years at a World Cup or the Olympics. In Canada, the highest participant rate in sports is in soccer. Canada has the third largest player pool for women’s soccer.”
A key takeaway from her time at True North: “The vision was so much bigger than simply running hockey teams. It was about the impact you can make through sports on your community and the sense of responsibility you have in delivering that. That’s something I’ll never forget and bring to my day to day.”
A turning point during university: “I switched to a minor in women’s studies and feminism started to influence my worldview—that started at UM.”
How she sees the future of sports: “My son, who’s 15, doesn’t see a difference between men and women’s professional athletes anymore. He’s as excited to watch Natalie Spooner play in a game with the Toronto Sceptres as he is Josh Morrissey in a Jets game.
We’re at a tipping point. People are paying attention and it’s time to deliver.”

Paul Soubry [BComm(Hons)/84] smiles when talking about his days as a not-so-studious-student at UM, while balancing studying, part-time jobs and being a Bisons basketball player. But his career trajectory is no joke. Starting out in the oil patch, Soubry would leap into two decades with StandardAero, including as their CEO, before taking the helm at NFI Group, which includes New Flyer and Motor Coach Industries, now North America’s largest manufacturer of buses and coaches.
His take on sustainability: “We’re the largest player in Canada and the United States and, just before COVID, we acquired the world’s largest double-decker maker, which is headquartered in Scotland. We build products that move the world’s most precious cargo: people. And every zero-emission bus we put on the road takes a tired diesel out of service, which has a material impact on emissions.”
A lesson from his first-year business class: “The prof shared the story of President Kennedy going to the NASA Space Center and seeing a guy with a broom in his hand and saying, ‘What do you do?’ and expecting him to say, ‘I’m the janitor.’ And he said, ‘I’m helping to put somebody on the moon.’ Getting all of our employees aligned around what we do and why we exist is so important.”
World leaders who’ve visited NFI sites: “I toured Prime Minister Trudeau through our Winnipeg facility and Joe Biden through our Minnesota facility when he was vice-president. Last year I also toured Kamala Harris through our Minnesota plant. When people that set policy and chart the paths for our countries want to see what we do and meet our team, it’s pretty special.”
Why a close-knit business community is key: “We tour a lot of businesses through here. Not that we have all the answers, but I’m all about sharing and borrowing ideas. When we do that we’re all better off.”
Why UM, his alma mater, is still top of mind: “That’s our supply chain for people. There’s very few places in Canada or the U.S. where we have the direct ability and influence, as a business person, to be able to say, ‘You’ve got to go train these skills or there’s an appetite for this or that,’ and then watch it come out in the next year’s grads. That’s what’s special about UM, about what we have here in Manitoba.”
Another reason to stay in Winnipeg: “While we have over 45 locations around the world, Winnipeg is no question the headquarters. In a city this size, there’s a chance to build strong relationships, including with the Mayor, Premier and federal government. The special part of Winnipeg is that it’s big enough, but it’s small enough.”

During the pandemic, Joss Reimer [MD/08, MPH/13] became a household name as a public face of Manitoba’s COVID-19 response. As medical lead of the vaccine rollout, her clear communication and calm demeanor guided the province through uncertainty. But her impact goes beyond press briefings—Reimer’s career has been defined by a commitment to public health, from helping to create Manitoba’s first Naloxone distribution program to becoming president of the Canadian Medical Association (CMA).
The bump in her career path that lead to public health: “I initially planned to become an obstetrician. But during my residency, I experienced severe burnout. I started to doubt whether I could even do medicine. I’m glad, in retrospect, because I’m really happy with where I ended up.”
What she loves about this field: “Trying to identify the issues my community is facing and then coming up with solutions and then trying to get those solutions put through, which is often the most challenging part. You’re treating the whole community as your patient rather than just the one person.”
One of her most rewarding career moments so far: “When, for the first time, Naloxone was made freely available to those most at risk of opioid overdoses. Before that you could buy it but most people who need the antidote to opioid drugs can’t afford it.”
Another big win: “We managed to get over 90 per cent of Manitobans to get at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. That’s an unheard-of number. I had an amazing team.”
What she’s excited about as CMA president: Us shifting to keeping people at home with the appropriate resources for being cared for. Getting rid of the administrative burden that takes up time in the health-care sector. Looking at climate change and its impacts on health—and the impacts that the health-care system contributes because we’re the largest contributor as a sector, making up roughly 5 per cent of greenhouse emissions.”
At the University of Manitoba, Bisons are at the centre of health care, finance, Reconciliation and so much more. Wherever there’s a challenge, you’ll find UM alumni leading the charge. Explore the Bisons at the Centre campaign and meet other alumni who—like Christina Litz, Paul Soubry and Joss Reimer—are shaping Manitoba and beyond.