Amid the cascading snow at TD Place in Ottawa, a fluorescent figure trudged across the pitch, shovel in hand.
As he reached the penalty spot, Atlético Ottawa goalkeeper Nathan Ingham made two quick scoops, uncovering a square of turf under the layer of snow, before going to the edge of his 18-yard box and doing the same.
To the untrained eye, it may have looked like Ingham was doing his part to help the stadium's grounds crew as they looked to distinguish the pitch's lines on the snow-covered turf. In reality, however, his shovelling had a more practical explanation.
"As a goalie, obviously, you can't look backwards," said Ingham, "so you know your net based on your reference points with the penalty spot, the D is important, and then the corner of the box."
It was the 16th minute of the 2025 CPL Final, a match written into the Canadian soccer history books before the final whistle had even sounded — one that after 120 minutes of action, signified Atlético Ottawa winning their first North Star Cup in a 2-1 extra-time victory over Cavalry FC. Ingham's father joked with him after the game that it was the most he had ever seen him shovel.
"I wasn't thinking in the moment, but yeah, people seem to love it," said Ingham at the club's end-of-season press conference on Wednesday.
Video and photos of Ingham shovelling quickly spread across the globe, surpassed in global virality only by teammate David Rodríguez's "icicle kick" equalizer which broke the internet not long thereafter. It was a moment that, in equal parts, demonstrated the absurdity of Sunday's CPL Final, but also the attention to detail which was crucial to Atlético Ottawa defeating Cavalry.
"People thought our biggest strength was ball-playing soccer," said Ingham. "Really, our biggest strength was that winner's mentality, no excuses mentality, and adapting to whatever is thrown at us, and I honestly think that's why we won."
For the team's captain and longest-serving player, he had waited a long time for this moment: getting to hoist the trophy alongside co-captain Alberto Zapater.
"The whole night feels fake," said an exuberant Ingham to OneSoccer's Kristian Jack after the 90 minutes. "It's a crazy game, crazy game. Long wait. But you play us in sand, you play us in snow, you play us on the moon. I don't care. This team is going to win."
For the 32-year-old Ingham, the match brought up memories of growing up in Keswick, shovelling out the area of a not-yet-frozen backyard rink and playing soccer in it with his brother.
It has been a long journey in the game since. After a brief time with the Toronto FC academy, he went to school at Florida Gulf Coast before turning professional in 2016 with FC Edmonton in the NASL. Two years later, he signed with York9 in the CPL, playing in the league's first-ever match on April 27, 2019 at Hamilton Stadium against Forge FC.
Since then, only the man who stood 105 snow-covered metres away during Sunday's final, Cavalry goalkeeper Marco Carducci, has been in between the sticks for more CPL matches.
When Ingham first joined Atlético Ottawa ahead of the 2022 season, they were coming off a campaign where they finished at the bottom of the CPL table. Under then head coach Carlos González, they quickly turned things around, playing a suffocating defensive style that won them the regular season and led them all the way to the 2022 Final. Despite an incredible crowd of 15,000 in the nation's capital that day, they lost 2-0 to Forge.
Three years later, he was one of only two Atlético Ottawa players from that final still with the team, and he joked that the other, Ballou Tabla, had taken a Turkish vacation in between. Tabla signed for Turkish club Manisa FK for the 2023 season, before returning to Atleti in 2024.
In his fourth season with the club, Ingham had taken on more responsibility than ever before as the team's captain and de facto mentor to a young backline of players almost exclusively aged 21 or younger. Add in the fact that despite an outstanding season, Atleti had nothing to show for their efforts, coming into the final having finished two points behind Forge in the regular season, and losing in the CanChamp semifinal to Vancouver FC, and there was a lot riding on the 2025 Final for him.
"Leading up to this game was by far the most pressure I have ever felt," Ingham told the Footy Prime Podcast. "It's one thing to be in a final, it's another thing to be a captain of a team going into a final."
If he was feeling nervous on Sunday, however, it didn't show. Ingham was as cool as the temperatures at TD Place (minus the snood he had around his ears), as he made five saves during the match. None were more crucial than a chaotic sequence in the 79th minute.
With the match deadlocked at 1-1, and the snow on the pitch as mountainous as it was all game, Ingham stopped a point-blank volley attempt from Cavalry's Daan Klomp before getting a piece of Caniggia Elva's attempt on the rebound. Eryk Kobza then had a great chance with Ingham out of position, but his shot was cleared off the line by Aboubacar Sissoko. The chaotic sequence left several Cavalry players with their heads in their hands, and Atleti's entire backline embracing.
"You saw it today, he saved us a couple of times, with those conditions," said 21-year-old Atlético Ottawa defender Loïc Cloutier after the match. "He's been doing it all season."
The orange ball, used to be visible in the winter conditions, was firmly in Ingham's hands when the final whistle went after nearly four hours of one of the most unique finals in world football, signalling Ottawa's first-ever CPL championship.
Nobody on the pitch understood more what that moment meant to the city and its fans than Ingham. Moments later, as he spoke to OneSoccer's Kristian Jack on the broadcast, Ingham had to bend over and take a deep breath to compose himself. Still, the usually exceptionally eloquent goalkeeper was nearly at a loss for words.
"It's unbelievable, it's honestly unbelievable," said Ingham. "This f--ing group is so great, so great and, I can't believe it...I can't believe it."
With the victory, Atlético Ottawa qualified for the 2025 Concacaf Champions Cup. It will be their first-ever continental competition. Perhaps, it will be Ingham again leading them out of the tunnel onto a snow-covered TD Place pitch in February to play against one of the region's top clubs.
Ingham, however, has what he called on TSN 1200 "the most difficult decision I've ever had to make" first. He is a free agent, and at 32, knows that if he wants to move to a higher level, this is probably his last chance. While he believes that would come with a backup role, he still has a lot to consider — including his life after soccer.
"I haven't had a minute to process anything," said Ingham. "I'm going to take as much time as I need to be in a good headspace and not make a decision right after the final whistle or whatever."
He says, however, that Ottawa feels the most like home of any place he has been since leaving Keswick at age 18. That love for the city, and the way the community has embraced him, will be a significant factor in his final decision.
Regardless of what happens next for Ingham, however, he has helped to deliver the club and their supporters a night they will never, ever forget. The game, and its unique conditions, have since taken a life of their own online, earning worldwide attention.
"It's crazy, I mean, it's a perfect storm," said Ingham. "With many sports on international break, there's a big of a dead period after the Saturday games. Playoff baseball was over because it was getting a lot of media attention. People needed something to talk about. And we gave them something to talk about.
"Everyone I know has brought it up, every country that any of these guys are from, it's front page news. It doesn't make any sense, but it's pretty cool."
As a player who has been there since the very start, seeing the CPL get global recognition has a special significance for Ingham. Whether or not he is in the league next season, he has unquestionably been a vital leader in where the CPL is today. In the most watched match in CPL history he was right where he was in its first-ever match, guarding the net.
