Not always do we get a chance to follow up on stories, but we have that opportunity for the Red Deer Senior C Men’s lacrosse team, the Silverbacks. They eventually went on to defeat the Calgary Irish and became the provincial champions. Over the season they went 16 and 1, losing only one game. They won all five of their playoff games, but that wasn’t enough for them, they wanted more.

Eight teams from British Columbia got together in the Treasure Cove Cup, the best of B.C. tournament in Prince George. Red Deer put a team together to compete in this tourney. They played five games. The first was played on Friday night where they defeated Prince George 7-5.

Now if you don’t know lacrosse 7-5 is a very low score. At first, one might attribute that to the Silverbacks defense.

“We had such good defense all year which you have to have to win as much as we did this year. Guys like Adam Reynolds, Matt Howard, Jeff Gresham, Sean Ziegler and Brendan Luft are indispensable,” said Coach Brian Ziegler.

But that wasn’t the whole story. “Their nets are smaller than ours,” he added. “We didn’t know that until we got there.”

That’s right, the nets that B.C. plays with are smaller than the nets that Alberta plays with. So, defense may be good, but it ain’t that good!

Also, going against the Silverbacks in this tournament despite the travel and despite the smaller nets was Tyler McRobbie. You see McRobbie led the Alberta Senior C Men’s league in scoring this year. If anyone could figure out how to score on a smaller net, he’s the guy that could do it, except he wasn’t there.

In senior men’s anything, life sometimes gets in the way and it did for McRobbie — he had to work.

The Silverbacks played two games on Saturday losing to Coquitlam and winning over Armstrong. Port Moody defeated the Silverbacks on Sunday, 8-5, with the winner going onto the final.

In the bronze medal game, the Silverbacks would leave no doubt winning 12 -6. This year it was a bronze medal win for the Red Deer Senior C Men’s Silverbacks.

“We want to go back next year. And we want to win it”

That ends this year’s lacrosse season for Senior C Men’s. They won’t start practicing again until April. And then when their season starts, they can start working on those blemishes on their record — the one loss in their season — and then they will attempt to upset the province of B.C.

sports@reddeerexpress.com