They may have been undermanned but they overwhelmed their competition.
The Prince George Posse, with just 10 runners in uniform, battled to gold at the Matt Underwood minor lacrosse tournament in Victoria on the weekend. The Posse posted a 6-0 record, including a 6-2 win against the West Shore Whalers in Sunday's championship game.
Earlier in the tournament, the midget B Posse had beaten the Whalers 8-4.
"We knew that we couldn't go in overconfident because they were going to come out with fire," said Posse player Trevor Clark, who was picked as Prince George's MVP in the final. "So we just played how we played all tournament -- we passed the ball around, worked the clock down and took our shots when needed. We just played hard and they got into some penalty troubles, which got them down, so we took advantage and started racking up the points."
Tony Degans, head coach of the Posse, was particularly proud of the team's accomplishment because of the low number of players who were available for duty.
"We were probably one of the only teams there that had 10 runners," he said. "Everyone else had a full bench of 15 to 18 so we got a lot of compliments from other coaches, coming up to us after the games and saying, 'Wow, you guys are well-conditioned and you can still run the game with such a short bench.' It was nice to hear that."
In the semifinal round, the 15- and 16-year-old Posse downed a West Shore No. 2 squad 12-2. In their other preliminary games, the Posse dumped Nanaimo 9-2, edged Campbell River 9-7 and downed Cowichan Valley 7-1.
In the six games, the Posse outscored their opponents 51-18.
"We have lots of chemistry," the 16-year-old Clark said of the club's weekend success. "We know where each other are all the time so we're able to work the ball around and get the shots off and know when and where to put the ball."
Andrew Sivell of the Posse was chosen as the tournament's most valuable player. Other team members are goaltender Dalan Etter, Johnny French, Brandin Daychief, Dylan Turcotte, Nic Bernier, Sterling Cardinal, Olin Erricson, Gage Wasylyshen, Braeden Lalonde and the high-scoring Brogan O'Brien, who was unable to make the trip to Victoria.
To help fill out his lineup, Degans called up Steven Kidwell from the bantam Posse and Kidwell proved to be a key contributor in all four games he played.
"It was nice to have Steven with us," said Degans, who is assisted by Allison Sands. "He helped us out with our running situation."
The tournament victory was the first of the season for the Posse. Two weekends ago at a Salmon Arm event, they finished third.
Next on the Posse's schedule is a major tournament in Calgary on the July long weekend. That event will be perfect preparation for provincials, later in July in Port Coquitlam.
Degans said the Posse will "definitely" contend for the B.C. title.
"We were missing one of our main guys this weekend, Brogan, and with having an extra player of that calibre out there [at provincials] it's going to make us tough to beat," he said.
