Oceanside’s two first-year field lacrosse teams are back home from the frozen tundra in Burnaby and their big debut in the B.C. championships.
The Buccaneers had two teams in the Tier 2 provincial finals — U12s and U14s — played out at Burnaby Lake Sports Complex.
In his post-tournament recap U14 Bucs’ head coach Tim Clermont said the locals, who were one goal away from moving on to the medal round, opened their tournament against New West who played the regular season in Tier 1, but were allowed to move down for the playoffs.
Bucs’ goalie Riley Kuxhaus said Clermont, “was stellar, picking off quality shots like Harry Potter catches the snitch.”
Chase Anderson staked the Bucs’ to a 1-0 lead early, and the game became a defensive battle with Oceanside up 2-1 at the half and the Salmonbellies scored late in the third to draw even at 2-2 and went on to win 6-3.
“We had never played in such a low scoring game,” said Clermont, adding a few giveaways in the their own end cost the Bucs against New West “who play all season on turf, and for our boys the adjustment was the difference in the game as the ball seemed harder (for the Bucs) to pick up. We were accustomed to scooping the ball in deep grass and the shallow, carpet like turf was a challenge for us.”
Back at it that evening against the PoCo Saints with the temperature -4 C and dropping fast, the Buccaneers ‘laid an egg’ and lost 7-1.
“This team was not very good but we played our worst game of the season,” Clermont surmised.
The Buccaneers bounced back the next day against the Coquitlam Adanacs, battling hard but having to settle for man 8-8 tie.
Oceanside took it to Coquitlam early and led 3-2 after the first quarter, and the game was tied 5-5 at the half.
“Both teams played hard, man to man battles, but Oceanside dominated in speed and physical play,” said coach, adding, “the refs were not giving us any breaks and we were guilty of a few late hits and hits on the back that put us short a man for much of the second half.”
The Adanacs took advantage of their plethora of power plays and were leading the game 8-6 with 10 minutes remaining, but Jory Clermont won all the face-offs from then on and the ‘Bucs fought back to tie the game on goals by Shamus Koughan and Jake Zboyovsky. With about four minutes to play “the ‘Bucs played hard and had chances to win but the game ended in a tie.”
In the end, the Buccaneers learned that based on the goals-for-and-against format, had they scored one more goal along the way they would have advanced to the medal round.
“We received many kudus from the BC Lacrosse association staff and fellow teams for our amazing accomplishment, the only first year U14 team to make provincials and almost the finals. “
Earning tourament team MVP honours were Bucs’ goalie Riley, centre middie Jory, and right middie Liam Lowrey with the Team Warrior award to big stick Ian Whibley. Tim was awarded the tournament’s Most Sportsman Like Coach award for the eight-team U14 division, who was duly proud of his feisty team of first year players.
“Field lacrosse is now on the map in Oceanside, and next year we hope to field three teams including a U16 team,” he said.
SNOW FINALS
The Tier 2 medal round featuring the North Island Ravens, the New West Adanacs and North Okanagan, had to be cancelled due to heavy snow. As it would be too costly to reschedule the final round, New West was awarded the Gold medal, Okanagan silver and NI bronze based on the first three games.