TEAM CANADA MEN AND WOMEN LOOKING FOR REPEAT SUCCESS
| Canada’s Men’s and Women’s Senior Flag Football teams are gearing up for the 2010 IFAF Flag Football World Championships. This biannual IFAF event is being hosted by Canada for the second consecutive time. This year’s games are being played at the RA Centre in Ottawa while the 2008 edition of the World Flag Championships took place in Jean-Sur-Richelieu, Quebec. The Canadian men are looking to defend their gold medal from 2008 while the women are looking to improve upon their second place finish.
In this brand of football there are no field goals. Offensive possessions start from team’s own five yard line and are given 4 plays to make it to midfield, then another four to score. The field dimensions are 70 yards long and 25 wide.
The Canadian Men’s and Women’s divisional entries to the Flag Football World Championships were determined at an open 12 team tournament at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario on April 17 and 18, 2010. Team Nova Scotia won the male division while the Fleur de Lys entry from Quebec won the Canadian women’s bracket.
Team Nova Scotia won the Men’s division on the last play of the game against Quebec’s St-Jean Wolfpack with a long touchdown strike from Quarterback Shawn Johnson to receiver to AJ Tufford. The final score was 20-19. Johnson threw two majors to Tufford and another to Jason Bailey while both Bailey and Tufford nabbed passing converts.
Nova Scotia team entry of eight will be bolstered for the World Championship with four additional players from the tournament including Mark Remillard from St-Jean Wolfpack, Nova Scotia’s opponent in the National final.
To win the Women’s pool, Quebec’s Fleur de Lys defeated Geant another entry from Quebec, 45- 24 to win the opportunity to represent Canada at the IFAF World Flag Championship. Fleur de Lys’ quarterback Vanessa Birri threw a total of six touchdown passes. Outstanding receiver Joanie Lanthier scored four majors while Avery Brevett added three converts. Fleur de Lys will also add four players that participated in the tournament to their World Championship roster to their winning roster entry of eight.
Halifax’s Vince (Dan) Williams is very excited to get the tournament started. “It’s an unbelievable honour,” said Williams. “I would say this is the pinnacle of football I’ve ever played. Having experienced a few different levels of football, this is the greatest honour of my life playing football.That first game … I can’t even imagine what the emotions will be standing on that field and wearing that (Team Canada) jersey. I can definitely say it’s a dream come true.”
The Canadian Men’s team play their first game against Italy at 9 AM on Friday while the Women kick off the tournament against the USA at 10:15 AM. Full schedule can be found below.
For all tournament information, schedule and news please visit WWW.FFWC2010.COM
Team Canada’s Schedule:
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