Upon the completion of the 2002 Canadian Wheelchair Rugby Championships, the team held a two day National Team Selection Camp. The new team for 2003 will be announced in mid-June after the World Championships.

In preparation for those same World Championships, which are to be hosted by the Swedes in Gothenburg, Team Canada went south to the excellent facilities in Warm Springs, Georgia, to scrimmage with the top-ranked Americans, and the 5th ranked Swedes.

Our first scrimmage game was against one of the two US teams. This team had some members from their team going to Worlds, as well as others from their development squad.

Friday – May 10th Scrimmages:

USA 1 vs Canada (CAN 35 - USA 32)

Scorers for our team included: Garett Hickling (11), Ian Chan (11), David Willsie (10), Al Semeniuk (2), and Patrice Simard (1).

We went on to play back-to-back games later that day, with our National Team defeating the Swedes 41-29, followed by a two-point loss to the Americans in our final game of the day.

Goal scorers in the CAN-SWE game were: David Willsie (12), Mike Whitehead (10), Garett Hickling (5), Ian Chan (5), Adam Frost (4), Al Semeniuk (4) and Patrice Simard (1).

Earning points for the red and white team in the CAN-USA game was: Garett Hickling (12), David Willsie (11), Ian Chan (10), and Al Semeniuk (2).

Saturday's schedule had another trio of games on slate for our National team players, with games against the USA at 9:30 and 4:15, and a game against the Swedes sandwiched in at 2:30. The first game against the Americans saw our team lose by a 4-goal margin, 31-35. Seven players earned goals for our team, with Ian Chan leading the way with 11 goals. Other scorers included Garett Hickling (5), Patrice Simard (4), Mike Whitehead (4), Al Semeniuk (3), David Willsie (3), and Dave Gagné with 1.

In our final game against Sweden, we fully used our bench and sat out star captain Garett Hickling, and still managed a 2-goal victory, 39-37. Goal scorers included Ian Chan (12), David Willsie (8), Daryl Stubel (6), Mike Whitehead (6), Patrice Simard (4), and Adam Frost (1).

Leading goal scorers for these scrimmage games were:

Ian Chan (49)
David Willsie (44)
Garett Hickling (33)
Mike Whitehead (20)
Al Semeniuk (13)
Patrice Simard (10)
Daryl Stubel (6)
Adam Frost (5)
Dave Gagné (1)

A combined team of Swedish and Canadian players then took on the Americans in a fun match to round out the series of games.

Training for the Canadians continues through to tomorrow, with the team returning home on Wednesday. The World Championships are to be held from May 28th - June 2nd.