Who will be crowned Canada’s 2019 Minto Cup champion?
Will the Orangeville Northmen capture a seventh Minto Cup championship or perhaps the defending champion Coquitlam Adanacs earn a fourth Minto Cup, which would be their third in the past four years.
Maybe it will be the Victoria Shamrocks who end a three-decade title drought, winning the organization’s first Minto Cup since 1988.
Or could it be the Okotoks Raiders making history by becoming the first Alberta team to win the biggest prize in Canadian junior lacrosse.
The question will be answered over the next 10 days as Langley Events Centre hosts the 2019 Minto Cup Junior A Championship.
“The Minto Cup is one of the most difficult championships to win as an athlete. Your time in junior lacrosse is limited and in that short period of time attempting to win a Minto Cup is very difficult,” was the message from Ron McQuarrie, the Canadian Lacrosse Association box chair at a press conference on August 15.
“Take advantage of the opportunity that you have here, put everything you have into this and I am sure everyone is going to be proud to watch the best lacrosse that we are going to see in Canada.”
The four-team tournament gets underway August 16 and runs until August 26, should the best-of-five championship series go the full distance.
The championship pits the winners of the provincial leagues, the BC Junior A Lacrosse League’s Coquitlam Adanacs, the Rocky Mountain Lacrosse League’s Okotoks Raiders and the Ontario Junior A Lacrosse League’s Orangeville Northmen. The trio are joined by the Victoria Shamrocks, the BCJALL finalists, who earned the second berth into the four-team event with B.C. serving as this year’s Minto Cup host.
There will be a pair of games on each of the first three days as the four teams complete the round-robin portion with the fourth-place finisher eliminated on August 18.
The opening day (Friday, August 16) sees Orangeville battle Victoria at 5 p.m. and Okotoks face Coquitlam at 8 p.m. Day two (Saturday, August 17) features Victoria and Okotoks in the early game followed by Orangeville and Coquitlam and the final day (Sunday, August 18) begins with the Raiders and Northmen squaring off and then the round-robin concludes with the two B.C. rivals facing off. Game times are 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. for the weekend games.
On Monday (August 19), the second and third-place finishers face a one-game semifinal showdown with the winner advancing to face the first-place finisher in the best-of-five series. Games 1, 2 and 3 are August 21, 22 and 23, respectively, while games four and five are set for August 25 and 26, if necessary. All the championship series games have 7 p.m. start times.
For tickets, click here or to stream the games online, visit www.tfsetv.ca.
For full schedule and results, visit www.mintocup2019.com.