Kadie Smith
There are some moments in your life that stay with you no matter where you go, some relationships that affect you through every other, some monumental thing that is able to transcend the moment so that you feel it’s significance immediately. For Mike Benevides, that moment came as he was preparing to graduate high school.
Benevides was the captain of his Central Tech high school football team in Toronto at the time, and he and his team were at a year-end banquet, year books in hand. As he scanned the signatures, he saw there was one missing, that of Bill Naylor, one of the 
coaches and a man Benevides calls his mentor.
“I managed to catch him just as he was leaving,” said Benevides. “In the back he wrote ‘go west, young man.’ He died the next morning.”
As the captain, the former 270lb. lineman was charged with the task of informing the team of Naylor’s passing. “As an 18 year old, that’s a pretty traumatic thing to got through,” Benevides said. “I loved him; I cared about him. He was this huge figure, a guy that taught me things about life and about discipline and self respect.”
The words were felt immediately. At the time, the Ontario native was struggling with choosing a University and grappling with the all-too-real dilemma for a lot of Canadian kids in football: how can I continue playing? He took the words at their most literal sense and went west, to Bakersfield College in California on a full football scholarship. From there, it was Calgary, where he first met Wally Buono, and then Vancouver. Those words resonate with him every day. “I’ve kind of just kept going west,” he said with a smile.
The former defensive coordinator has always had a love for the game, but admits that even as a player it was the preparation, the strategy, the scripting and play calls that really grabbed his attention. He’s a focused and serious man, intense on the sidelines and quiet in the office. Poised and professional at all times. Coaching just called to him.
Now the head coach of the BC Lions, Benevides has the chance this season to do something unique: win a Grey Cup with the Lions as a Canadian coach in Vancouver, the city that he and his family call home, the city where he has raised his children, the city where he has set down roots and grown both in his personal life and as a professional.
“Never in my wildest dreams did I think I could be a head coach in the CFL,” said Benevides. “I had no visions of where I’d end up. This is one of the best things that’s ever happened to me. Moving here in 2003 with my wife enabled us to grow as a family.”
His story of origin is as well known as the man who came before him, the man with whom he honed his skills and sharpened his direction, first in Calgary and then BC. It is perhaps because of Wally that Benevides is so prolific. Taking over the head coaching position in 2012 from one one of the winningest coaches in CFL history will garner you some attention.
“Working for or working under a legend, in our business, that’s typically something you don’t do,” he said. “I look at it as an honour though.”
The two have a unique relationship that has changed from a mentor/pupil one to one the head coach calls contemporary. They’re 
different in coaching styles and approach, but having been together for so many years, Benevides says there’s a lot of Wally in him. Both are children of immigrant parents, both have hard edges to them bred of competitiveness. Both are extremely opinionated, tough even. Everything they have, they’ve had to earn.
“I think over time we’ve learned about each other,” Benevides said of his confidant. “We’ve gone through the wars together. He and I have been together a long time, time for me to gain his trust and respect for he to understand how I work and vice versa. When I took the head coaching job he was very clear and I was very clear that I’m going to do it my way.”
His own way is something Benevides says continues to be bred by those words left on a picture so many years ago, a figurative meaning that he applies to different aspects of his life. Go your own way. Go into the unknown. Trust your instincts.
This season, the Lions are poised and ready to come back from an upsetting 2013 where they lost to the eventual cup winners, the Roughriders, in the Western Semi-Final. After what Benevides describes as the best training camp he’s been a part of, the Lions had their fair share of turmoil and adversity in the first half of this season, but he’s confident they’re growing each day to where they want to be.
With a wealth of talent in the likes of star running back Andrew Harris, veteran pivot Kevin Glenn and their go-to Travis Lulay coupled with the defensive prowess of arguably the league’s best shut-down duo in Soloman Elimimian and Adam Bighill, the possibility is there for the Leos to repeat their championship 2011 season. Add the rookie phenoms Josh Johnson, Ronnie Yell and Alex Bazzie and the future looks bright in BC with Benevides at the helm.
Go west, young man. It’s funny how one sentence can have so many different meanings.