Senior C lacrosse championship returns in August
After a six-year absence, the B.C. senior C lacrosse championship is coming back to Prince George.
The B.C. senior C championship will be combined with the Treasure Cove Casino Canadian Senior Invitational lacrosse championship, Aug. 11-13, at Kin 1 and 2.
The senior C tournament will include teams from the Prince George Senior Lacrosse Association as well as teams in the Lower Mainland, from Vancouver Island and the Okanagan. To be eligible to win the Fred Doig Trophy as B.C. champions, club teams are limited to a maximum of three non-roster players picked up for the tournament.
Formerly known as the Alcan Cup, the invitational tournament gives all club teams across Canada a chance to compete for the massive wood sculpture which distinguishes the trophy. There are no restrictions on the number of pickup players each team can have.
“It has become one of the more prestigious senior lacrosse championships in Western Canada,” said PGSLA commissioner Glen (Moose) Scott, now in his 27th year at the helm of the six-team senior league. “A lot of the clubs want to fight for the unique trophy and they like the idea they can play for a Canadian championship and put more emphasis on getting their teams to be able to play at that level and get on that side of the tournament.”
As long as roster restrictions are met, one team can win both titles.
The PGSLA season starts April 24 in Quesnel, the start of four consecutive games that week in the north Cariboo city, home of the M.J. Daniels Consulting Crossfire. Also competing for the PGSLA championship will be the Mack- enzie Lumberjacks, Northland Nissan Assault, Cowboy Ranch Stylers, Westwood Pub Devils, and the defending-champion RPR Mechanical/BX Pub Bandits.
At its annual general meeting on Sunday the league held its midget draft to allow the four Prince George teams to refill the talent pool with 12 graduating players from last year’s Prince George Posse team.
The Stylers went into the draft holding the first-overall pick and selected Alex Nimmo, and Hayden Kerr went second-overall, picked by the Assault. A trade in 2016 sent all three Westwood Pub draft picks to the Stylers for Dylan Long and they used the Devils’ third-overall pick to select Connor Adams. The Bandits chose Justin Parker with their fourth-overall pick.
The second-round players chosen were: Ryan Mager (Stylers), Adam Hassall (Assault), Elliot Zurita-Hadden (Stylers) and Ethan Brown (Bandits, later traded to Assault for second-round pick in 2019). The third round went as follows: Brendan Girard (Stylers), Lucas Rushton (Assault), Seth Blacker (Stylers), Scott Sampson (taken by Stylers after Bandits passed).