Friday, April 4, 2008

Cross Country Check-Up: April 2008

Nation,

Once a month, I hope to have a post dedicated to the burning ultimate questions facing the major teams and players across the land.

If you have any questions or stories to share... or can provide the answers to a question feel free to post to this thread each month.
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East Coast

  • When does Newfoundland send a team to nationals?
  • When does PEI register in a major tournament?
  • Can Red Circus (Halifax) recover from the major losses of Ramsay Wright and Brad Callaghan?
  • Will a team from New Brunswick pose any challenge nationally?
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Quebec
  • Is Q (open, Quebec city) dead? Do they help form a co-ed team destined to medal?
  • Which Montreal open B team is better- Magma or the newly formed Demon (Mephistio affiliate)?
  • Why the hell did Camelot (Montreal, coed) walk away from coed in a worlds year, when they did some well at Nationals 2006?
  • Where is Lorne Beckman this summer?
  • When is the Storm (women's) calender coming out?
  • Does Sherbrooke continue to improve?




Mephisto Versus GOAT- Nats Final 2006
Source: George Ghiz
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Ontario
  • How does GOAT stay motivated within its own borders?
  • Who is better in women's- Stella (Ottawa) or Toronto's Lotus?
  • Does Anne Mercier plays worlds in coed with friends or women's? Does she rebound from a subpar Nationals 2007 final?
  • How good is Ottawa open? Is the Toronto talent drain plugged?
  • Did Tombstone make the right Worlds roster decision(s)?
  • How badly will Grand Trunk miss Peter Jamieson?
  • Will Too Bad qualify for nationals?
Savvy Justine Price Source: Ultypics.com
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Prairies
  • Will Mangina be better or worse? Will they get a website?
  • Will General Strike medal at nationals?
  • Will this be Calgary's year in open? How long is the window of opportunity?
  • Does Edmonton play open at nationals, and how good will they be?
  • What happens to Team Alberta (women's) this year?
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British Columbia
  • Furious George
    • Who joins them for worlds?
    • Can they repeat?
    • Do they go to worlds and win?
    • Do they go to nationals?
  • Traffic
    • Are they Canada's best women's team?
    • Can they beef up and take down the US?
  • Team Fisher Price
    • Do they pick up the right players for Worlds?
    • Can they stay healthy?
    • Are they too young to win worlds?
  • Can Blackfish be as good as last year without Matt Cole
  • Is Victoria a force at nats? Do they appear?
  • What city emerges at nationals outside of Vancouver/Victoria?
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6 comments:

Unknown said...

Re Lorne Beckham: no idea who this guy is, but Lorne Beckman is coaching Storm this year.

Camelot - the main purpose for this team was to win Canadian Nationals, after they attained their goal the top men and ladies went on to Open and Womens for 2007. I too was shocked that they didn't reform in 2007, but that was what Lorne told me when I was talking to him at Boston Invite 2007.

joelyb said...

RC will be fine. (many strong players still)

Phoenix will be huge this year, Alexander returning, Ramsey Wright, Callahan.

Too bad will have a tough time ontario bids will be GOAT, Phoenix, Nads, GT, Seven, STR, Too bad.
so a couple of those teams won't make it to nationals.

westwell said...

STR may have found the righteousness. Do they continue on to Calgary? Only time will tell.

Anonymous said...

As I understood it, I don't think Magma was ever Mephisto's "B team". It just happened that Mephisto was generally a stronger club. Magma's core had developed so much that they were playing at a similar level as Mephisto. Therefore, both teams decided it was time to join forces.

I could be wrong, but this would mean that Magma will be defunct next year, unless they have an entirely new roster. So next year it should be Mephisto A, Demon B, Magma gone, or a C team (like GOAT, GT and Roy).

Montreal may be throwing more weight around in the elite open category as they have apparently attracted the top players from McGill, Magma, and some co-ed teams to play with Mephisto this year.

Sport Management Steven said...

Nice posts people.

Derek- You passive aggressive bi^ch. You're better than that tall guy! I acknowledge the typo.

I still don't know why you would pass on a chance to win a worlds berth with such high chance of success.

Joel- Good to hear about Red Circus. I played on the first DKUT team in 2000-2001, and I have always been concerned with the transient nature of comp players in Halifax can cause some issues.

Phoenix and its second team will be much stronger this year. But it always depends on who plays, and if players decide to play in the city rather than Montreal/Toronto

Westwell- STR boasted a lot of young UWO players, most of them Aurora players who capitalized on the large number of Ontario bids at Nats.

Not sure if we'll see them at regionals.

MLAB- I wasn't insinuating the Magma was ever a B team. I have been under the impression that there will be three open teams from Montreal this year- Mephisto, their b team Demon, and a separate entity called Magma.

It will be interesting to see if the McGill talent can replace the very solid old guard that Mephisto relies on.

Daniel said...

Q is dead. Everything that I have heard indicates that the intention is to put together a co-ed team in the “nation’s” capital. If they medal will very much depend on who else decides to show up at Nationals… as we know getting the big teams to show up in these off years can be a challenge.

Demon will be better than Magma. Mephisto swallowed up last year’s Magma and is using the influx of players to create a two team open system similar to Phoenix/Firebird. The captain of Magma from three years ago doesn’t want to see the name die so he is forming a new open team but is using the name Magma.

Camelot was built for 2006; winning Nationals and going to WUCC.

Lorne will be coaching the Montreal women’s team, Storm. They will be stronger for it.

I hear that just for you the Storm calendar will show a lot more skin this year, maybe even a breast or two.

Sherbrooke will continue to improve. I don’t know how it will translate onto the field at competitive tournaments but they have an unbelievably strong program in place. In a few years they will be the model that everyone turns to for developing a strong league and strong players, especially considering that they are making it work with a population base of only 150,000.