Raiders, Mounties vie for Minto Cup
After 117-year drought, Alberta lacrosse teams aiming to make history at home
It’s 117 years and counting ...
That’s how long the Minto Cup has been around and how many years an Alberta lacrosse team has been shut out of hoisting the coveted championship mug.
This year, two clubs — the host Calgary Mountaineers and the Alberta champion Okotoks Raiders — aim to change such an unenviable history.
And they ’ll try to do that in their own backyard, with Canada’s Junior A national box lacrosse championship — a.k.a. the Minto Cup — beginning Thursday at Max Bell Centre.
“It’s going to happen — hopefully, this is the year,” said Raiders head coach Andrew McBride of ending Alberta’s 0-for-history run at the Minto Cup. “We’ve got a really highly skilled team, we’re fast and we’re athletic, and I think we’re prepared to come out and show what Raiders lacrosse is all about.”
Standing in their way are champions of two provinces from which the winners have captured all but six Minto Cups, and every one since 1908. They are the Brampton Excelsiors, the Ontario champs who’ve yet themselves to claim the national title, and the Coquitlam Adanacs, the B.C. kings who’ve made the Minto Cup tournament in each of the last 10 seasons.
“Ten years here — that’s an amazing accomplishment,” McBride said. “(Adanacs head coach Patty Doyle’s) got his (good-luckto-the-rest-of-you) speech down.”
Whether Doyle & Co. also get to deliver a victory speech — one they ’ve done twice in the last eight years — remains to be seen.
But there’s no doubt the Adanacs and the Excelsiors are the cofavourites of the 2018 Minto Cup, which concludes with a best-offive final beginning Tuesday.
“Really they’re just another team,” said Raiders captain Harrison Matsuoka. “Yeah, they come from Ontario and B.C., but at the end of the day, they ’re just another team and you get over that ( being awestruck) pretty quickly.”
For the Raiders, in particular, what they need quickly in the six-game round robin that runs Thursday through Sunday is a win, something that has eluded them during their brief history at the Minto Cup.
“Last year, we came close — two games that we let slip away in the third period,” Matsuoka said of their 2017 Minto Cup appearance in Brampton, Ont. "So there’s a lot of guys in that core group last year who are back again this year. We’re just really looking for revenge, and we’re excited. We think we’ve got a really good shot this year. We just have to get that first win.
“That means sticking to our game plan and executing it — being fast, and if teams mess up, just making them pay.”
For the Mountaineers — a.k.a. the Mounties — they’re looking to build off what was a successful 2016 Minto Cup run.
In that tourney, they defeated both the Delta Islanders, from B.C., and the Orangeville Northmen, the Ontario champs who eventually went on to lose the best-of-five final series to the Adanacs.
“Unfortunately we fell short in making it to the final, but it was a great opportunity for our guys to be a part of it and see what it was all about and go through that process,” said Mounties head coach JoeVetere.
“This year, it really comes down to leadership and the way they’ve put themselves forward as far as being leaders,” Vetere continued. “They’ve really taken the team on their back and created a family, and that’s what our organization is all about. We have the culture and the family aspect that guys are going to go to war for us.”
Vetere’s captain, Ryan McLean, echoed his coach’s sentiment.
“That was really exciting and definitely adds to confidence,” said Mounties captain Ryan McLean of the two round-robin victories two seasons ago. "But ultimately we didn’t achieve our goal. So at this tournament, we’re looking to do a bit better and hoist the cup at the end.
"The first time you’re playing teams from Ontario and B.C., there is that awe. But after you’ve done it, they’re just another team in your way. We just have a lot of guys who are really hungry, a lot of guys who want to make history and be the first Alberta team to win the Minto Cup. We have that drive. We have to battle through. It’s not going to be easy.
“But at the end of the day, we’re fighting our battles and we’re going to come out successful.”
The rival Raiders are copping the same attitude.
“Appreciate the moment — first of all,” said McBride, former captain of the Calgary Roughnecks. "Our kids have worked extremely hard and I’m proud of them for that, and our organization has put a lot of time and effort into achieving this goal. It’s an amazing opportunity to play for the national championship in front of your family and friends in your own backyard, so we’re going to relish the opportunity and come out and play the best lacrosse we can.
“You have to realize in this tournament that when you play highcalibre teams that you haven’t seen all year that you’re going to get punched in the face, and how you respond is how your tournament is going to go. There’s going to be adversity. You’re going to have to battle back and ride the tides of emotion and come back and be even stronger. I think we’ve been emotionally tough — the sevengame (Alberta championship) series with the Mounties helped usgetpreparedandhelpedusget focused to get to that emotional level, and it’s going to be something we’re going to need in the Minto Cup.”