SMU’s Soccer Star: Suzanne Muir
Photo by Shannon Doane
If you’ve ever wandered through the second floor of The Homburg Centre on campus, there’s a good chance that you have seen the painting shown here. It hangs on the wall in the Saint Mary’s University Sport Hall Of Fame & Heritage Centre, which was founded in 1995 to celebrate “individuals who have made a significant contribution to the athletic programmes at Saint Mary's, and who, as a result of this contribution, have enhanced the image and reputation of the institution”, as their website states. This certainly describes the subject of this painting, SMU alumna Suzanne Muir.
Muir was born in Brockville, Ontario to Maritimer parents, who moved back to Nova Scotia in Muir’s early years, eventually settling in Dartmouth. She began playing soccer at the age of 13 and went on to attend Prince Andrew High School in her later teenage years. While in high school, Muir was awarded athlete of the year three times, being involved in basketball and track and field as well as soccer.
In 1989, after graduating from high school, Muir began attending Saint Mary’s, playing both soccer and basketball for the Huskies. It was at SMU that Muir’s career in sports took off. In her first season playing for the women’s soccer team, she was named Atlantic University Sport’s rookie of the year. Muir was also named SMU’s female athlete of the year twice, once in 1991 and again in 1993. On top of being a standout name in both of her sports, Muir also graduated with two degrees from SMU in five years, a BA and BComm. The time management skills Muir must have had to achieve all of this is incredible.
Photo by Nova Scotia Sport Hall of Fame
From there, Muir’s involvement with soccer only skyrocketed. In the early ’90s, she began playing for Nova Scotia’s provincial team under the coaching of John Kehoe while still playing for the SMU Huskies. This is an impressive feat, as the Nova Scotia provincial team was one of the best in the country at the time. With this team, the number of games won by Muir and the praise she lauded as a player only continued to grow, winning the Nova Scotia Provincial Championship four times and other awards from Atlantic University Sport, including two MVP awards and five all-star awards. During Muir’s time with the provincial team, they earned the Jubilee Trophy in 1994, which is awarded to the winning team of the Canadian national championship for women’s amateur soccer. In addition, the team also won the silver medal in women’s soccer at the 1993 Canada Games in Kamloops, where they lost in the final to Ontario.
In 1992, Muir began playing with the Canadian National Women's team, which she stayed with until 1999. During that time, Muir appeared in two FIFA world cups, the first being in Sweden in 1995, which was the first time the Canadian women’s team had ever played at this level of international competition. The second was in the U.S. in 1999. The SMU alumna was also a member of the team that won the CONCACAF (Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football) Women’s championship for Canada in 1998. During her career with the national team, Muir played 31 games altogether as a defender.
In an interview with Saltwire, Muir said that she had scored two goals while on the national team, but could not remember them. The information on these goals is available in her bio on Canada Soccer, however, which shows that her two goals were scored while playing in Etobicoke, Ontario in 1998. These matches were qualifiers for the World Cup, which allowed the Canadian team to appear in the FIFA Women’s World Cup in 1999. Along with playing for Team Nova Scotia and Team Canada, Muir spent some time playing for the British Columbia women’s soccer team, winning three championships with them in 1994, 1998, and 1999.
This year, Muir was inducted into the Canada Soccer Hall of Fame, becoming the first Nova Scotian with that honour. In addition to her Hall of Fame induction on a national level, Muir has been a member of the Nova Scotia Sport Hall of Fame since 2019, and of course, she has also been a member of SMU’s very own Sport Hall of Fame since 2014. With her various awards and achievements throughout her soccer career, it is not hard to see why Muir has become so celebrated within her sport.
Today, Muir lives in British Columbia, where she has worked in the Vancouver Police Force for 26 years, currently in the position of inspector. It may seem like a big departure from her experience in national sport, but the team player aspect of both jobs is where she really shines. Muir is a truly multi-faceted person with such a variety of talents, from sport to academics to her current work with the police. As such, Muir exceedingly represents the Santamarian spirit that SMU looks to foster in all of its alumni.