1996 - Phoenix, Arizona

Team : L'Équipe
Mike Ceresia, Jacques Demers, Josée Grand'Maître, Mike Green,
Sherman Greenfeld, Lori Jane Powell, Simon Roy, Vicki Shanks,
Christie Van Hees, Debbie Ward
Wheelchair : Fauteuil Roulant : Mark Cormack, Ken Michaylenko

Coaches : Entraîneurs - Ron Brown, Cal Smith (W/C : F.R.)
Referee : Arbitre - Denis Gaucher

Canadian Team Wins 7 Medals in Phoenix

By Cal Smith, from BCRA Newsletter, September-October 1996.

At the 8th IRF World Championships, held in Phoenix, Arizona, a strong Canadian team played their hearts our and came home with 1 Gold, 4 Silver, and 2 Bronze medals. Coaches Ron Brown of Winnipeg and Cal Smith of New Westminster said their teams couldn't have played any harder.

There were 31 countries represented at this event, and there promised to be some upsets as the tournament progressed, since a lot of countries had fielded strong teams this year. With defending World Champion Sherman Greenfeld and the rest of the mostly veteran team, Canada stood a good chance of coming away with a few medals.

During the Team Competition, which takes up the first three days, our Men's team (consisting of #1 Sherman Greenfeld, #2 Jacques Demers, #3 Mike Green, and doubles team Mike Ceresia and Simon Roy) went undefeated into the finals against Team USA. The first match of the day was our doubles team agains the American team of Adam Karp and Bill Sell. It was a hard-fought match but in the end Simon and Mike found a way to win the tiebreaker 11-10. This set the tone for the matches to follow, as the Americans clearly had thought they would win the doubles and coast from there.

Mike Green, playing in his first World Championships, had to play against Derek Robinson and didn't have too much luck, going down in two straight games. Next up was Jacques Demers against Todd O'Neil. Jacques played the match of his life and completely dominated Todd to win in two straight games.

Now it was up to our #1 player Sherman Greenfeld to play against USA #1 Reuben Gonzalez to decide the Gold Medal winner for the Men's Team event. With his match being televised live on the Arizona Sports Network, Sherman came ready to play and there was never a doubt that he would win as he completely outplayed Reuben in both games.

This is the first Team Gold Medal since the Men won Gold in 1988 in Hamburg, Germany, and it was a great feeling at the tournament as a lot of countries congratulated our team. We have some of the most popular players in these Championships and there were a lot of happy people when we won.

While the men were playing, the Women's Team was also playing the USA and it started out with the DOubles Team of Vicki Shanks and Debbie Ward playing Jackie Paraiso Gibson and Joy Paraiso. The match started out well for us but the USA team proved a little too strong and came away with a win in two straight games. Next up was #3 Lori-Jane Powell playing against Malia Bailey. Lori-Jane played a very strong match and won in the tie-breaker.

Our #2 player, Kelowna's Christie Van Hees, had to play against hard-hitting Cheryl Gudinas, and this was a real slugfest with both women pounding the ball on every shot. Cheryl managed to stay just ahead of Christie, though, and prevailed in two games. Now the deciding match was to be played between our #1 player, Josée Grand'Maître, and World Champion Michelle Gould. Michelle hasn't lost any matches lately, and she showed why in the match against Josée. This televised match was over quickly as Josée was overpowered by the best women's player in the world.

This meant that we had the Silver medal in the Women's Team event, and that the combined Men's and Women's Team had won the Overall Silver medal as well. The team had put in a great effort and were able to relax a little as the individual events wouldn't start until after a full day off.

In the Individual event, Christie Van Hees came away with a hard won Bronze medal after defeating American Malia Bailey. Malia was serving for the match at 14-11 but Christie fought back to beat her 15-14 and then 11-9 in the tiebreaker. Josée and Lor-Jane both placed in the top eight after losing in the semi-finals. Vicki and Debbie won the silver medal after losing another tough match with the American team.

Jacques Demers placed 4th and Sherman and Mike Green both lost in the quarter finals to end up in the top 8; Mike Ceresia and Simon Roy won the silver medal after losing a close 11-8 tiebreaker to the Americans.

In the Wheelchair division, Ken Michaylenko of Burnaby was proud to come home with a Bronze medal after losing a close 11-8 tiebreaker to American Steve Kuketz. Ray Boudreau of Toronto placed 4th in his first World Championships.

People from across the country are working hard to get more support from the government for this team, which brought seven models home from these World Championship.

Congratulation, Team Canada!