Minto Cup 2024 Preview: Four Teams Compete for National Jr. A Lacrosse Championship of Canada

By Adam Levi

Let the games begin.

The 2024 Minto Cup starts today at the Poirier Sport & Leisure Complex. The Orangeville Northmen versus the Port Coquitlam Saints kick off the tournament’s festivities, followed later in the evening by the hosting Coquitlam Adanacs squaring off against the Raiders Lacrosse Club. Each of the four competing teams is hoping to achieve Junior A glory, but only one will hoist the coveted Minto Cup by the end of the week-long event.

The Adanacs and Northmen have been Minto regulars over the last two decades, with both making their ultimate mark on the Minto by winning the tournament multiple times in that span - the Northmen have won four times, and the Adanacs have won three times. As for the Saints and the Raiders, well, this is Port Coquitlam’s first-ever Minto Cup appearance, and the Raiders are hoping to become the first team from Alberta to win the championship.

Looking at the host’s chances of winning the Minto Cup this summer, there’s little argument that the Adanacs have been one of, if not the most dominant team in Jr. A lacrosse this summer. With Head Coach Pat Coyle back on the bench this year, the Adanacs have been the force to be reckoned with out West this season. 

The Adanacs went 15-3 during the BCJALL regular season and a perfect 7-0 during the playoffs. Anchored by elite goaltender Jack Kask and a signature suffocating Pat Coyle defense in front of him, the Adanacs have been virtually unstoppable. That’s before even addressing their league-best offense that put up 12 goals per game during the regular season and 11.8 goals per game during the playoffs - both of these numbers were notably better than any other team in the BCJALL. 

The Adanacs will be looking for Minto redemption this week. Last summer, the Adanacs made it to the Minto Cup Final, but lost to the Burlington Blaze. The Adanacs last won the Minto in 2018 (and just before that in 2016) under Coach Coyle. 

With all of the success that the Adanacs have had this summer, Coach Coyle and his club are feeling pretty confident heading into the round robin. Having been in this position before, though, Coach Coyle knows his team will need to bring their A-game if they want to get back to the finals.

“We’re feeling good, but we’re also aware that we’re going to be playing some really good teams,” Coach Coyle said. “We need to be playing at our best if we want to be successful.”

If the Adanacs can make it to the finals and even pull off winning the Minto Cup on their home turf in front of their home fans, Coach Coyle knows it will be a magical Minto moment. It is rare to accomplish this feat, but in 2010, the Adanacs were able to do it. Can they repeat this epic achievement 14 years after the first time they did it?

“It’s hard to put that into words,” Coach Coyle said. “All the kids that are playing Junior (at least in our organization), first and foremost, think about winning the Minto. That, in itself, whether that’s in Alberta or Ontario or playing in Langley like we have, I think that it is magical within itself. But, to be able to do that in our own rink, in front of our own fans and our families, where most of these guys have played since they were little kids, it would be like the stuff dreams are made of.”

Port Coquitlam’s run to the Minto has been fuelled by solid goaltending and a strong defense anchored by Brayden Laity, who took home the British Columbia Jr. A Lacrosse League’s Reginald “Pop” Phillips Memorial Award for Best Defensive Player for the third summer in a row. Laity and his defensive teammate, Caelan Mander, both spent time in the National Lacrosse League last season - Laity was playing for the Vancouver Warriors and Mander was on the Halifax Thunderbirds’ roster. Saints Goaltender Ashton Brown has regularly and skillfully been there to back his defense up when needed - so to has netminder Imani Mitten, particularly in the early summer months. 

Offensively, Josh Mills, Anahalihs Doxtator, and Austin Lamoureux have been a three-headed monster this season. The trio combined for 80 of the team’s 170 regular season goals - that’s nearly 50% of the team’s production before the playoffs. In the postseason, a newcomer to the team, Silas Richmond, who came over from the Jr. A Delta Islanders, put the team on his back by scoring 19 of the team’s 65 goals.

The Saints’ rise over the past few summers has been very impressive. In 2022, the Saints completed the shortened season with a 1-13 record - now they’re in the Minto Cup. For Saints Head Coach Travis Cornwall, he feels a lot of pride in the tremendous improvements his team has made in such a short period of time. 

“There’s like 10-12 players that have been with us since that 1-13 season,” Coach Cornwall said. “Just to see all the work that they’ve put in, and all the things that we’ve asked them to do and improve upon to get to this point (and see them follow through on those things), that’s probably the coolest thing to think about.”

Their approach heading into the Minto Cup is going to be the same as it was all summer and every summer since he took over as the team’s bench boss in 2022. Coach Cornwall and the Saints believe they can win any game that’s in front of them. During the Minto’s critical round robin period to start the tournament, that’s the approach every team has to have. You only have three games to determine if you’ll be competing in the Minto Cup finals. Every. Game. Matters.

“If you asked me at the beginning of this season if we were going to go undefeated, there’s no way I was going to say, ‘We’re going to go undefeated.’” Coach Cornwall said. “But, before every game, if you asked me if we could win, I’d say, ‘Yes.’ That’s been our mentality all year where we just play the game that’s in front of us.”

Moving East and into the Prairies of Alberta, Raiders Lacrosse Club are happy to be back in the Minto Cup for the first time since 2019. How they made it back this summer is quite remarkable, considering how young they are. The Raiders are the youngest squad at this year’s Minto. They only have two graduating players on their roster, Colton Savard, the Saints’ captain, and Josh Goodman, the team’s assistant captain. The Raiders goaltender, Tommy Wood, who has played a pivotal role in the team’s success this summer, is also one of the older statesmen on this Raiders squad, but this is not his final year.

The Raiders needed to take down a more seasoned Miners Lacrosse Club to even make it to the Minto, and, boy, was that series interesting. After the Raiders won the first two games of the best-of-seven series, the Miners crawled back and took a 3-2 series lead. However, when it came time to buckle down in these win-or-go-home battles, the youthful Raiders dug deep and won the series.

For Coach Bannister, reaching the Minto Cup, especially in that fashion, is a surreal feeling. Following an 11-4 regular season and 4-0 sweep of the Mountaineers in the first round of the playoffs, the Raiders’ confidence was high heading into the RMLL Finals. 

By the end of the daunting yet victorious postseason, the Raiders’ Dylan Belliveau and Cash Frijters were the key plays that stirred the offense’s drink - they combined for 90 points in 11 playoff games. Wood and the defense were also quite masterful in Games Six and Seven - they allowed only six games in each of the last two games of the series.

With that epic seven-game series ending last Sunday, there is a quick turnaround between traveling West and settling in Coquitlam for the Minto. Still, despite their age and their recent grueling matches, Coach Bannister feels his team is more than capable of persevering once more. 

This will be a defining experience that will surely pay dividends in the future for this younger team. As a RMLL team, facing the best from the East and West is no small task, but the Raiders will do their best to stick to their game plan and be as prepared as possible for the three upcoming round robin matchups.

“We’ll wait and find out,” Coach Bannister said of his team’s readiness for this Minto Cup. “We’ve kind of been dealing with that [adversity] the whole year, and they’ve stepped up to the challenge. As a coaching staff, we’ve been there to Minto Cups and played in the NLL and all that - we’re going to try and prep them as much as possible - but, that experience is going to be a big thing. We know that we’re probably coming into the tournament as the underdog, which is fine, and we accept that role.”

As Western Canada sets out to make this year’s Minto Cup a special one - a Western team has not won the Minto Cup since the Adanacs did so in 2018 - the Northmen of the Ontario Jr. A Lacrosse League will be looking to keep the Eastern dominance going. 

The Northmen are happy to be back on the West Coast for the Minto Cup. The last time they won this tournament was back in 2019, when the event was held in Victoria, B.C. Interestingly, though, when the tournament was last held in Coquitlam in 2010, it was the Northmen who lost to the Adanacs in the finals. This time, they are hoping to reverse that result. 

The Northmen were juggernauts during the 2024 OJLL Season. They finished the regular season with a league-best 17-3 record and swept the first two rounds of the playoffs (against the Toronto Beaches and St. Catharines Athletics, respectively) before ousting the mighty Mimico Mountaineers after seven epic finals matchups. 

American Joey Spallina was electric all summer long, posting over 200 points (regular season and postseason combined), but he was not alone in fuelling the Northmen’s potent offense. Liam Matthews and Trey Deere were dominant offensive weapons as well. Those three combined for over 55% of the team’s total goals throughout the summer. Bowie Horsman (from the Brampton Excelsiiors and Brian Jackman (from the Oakville Buzz) were solid mid-season additions to the club and have fit in very well.

On the backend, the Northmen had Connor O’Toole in between the pipes for the summer. Outside of the rare blip of a game, O’Toole was excellent during the summer. He had a saver percentage above 81% and a goals against average just below 8.50. With defensive-minded graduating players such as Dante Bowen and Cam Pack in front of O’Toole, the Northmen defense has been tough to solve this summer. 

Yet, regardless of how well the team has done up to the Minto Cup, Northmen Head Coach Rusty Kruger wants his guys only focused on what’s right ahead of them, and that’s their first game of the round robin.

“Our focus is going to be on the first game - that first game is so important in that round robin,” Coach Kruger said. “You want to put yourself in the best situation to compete for the Minto Cup. We’re going up against some strong competition; all teams are very well coached.”

Much like the Raiders, the Northmen are a team that is having to do a quick turnaround after the seven-game finals series. The Northmen have already played 33 total games this summer, including two massively consequential games last weekend. Coach Kruger believes that all the hours and miles logged so far this summer could benefit his club.

“It can play in our favor,” Coach Kruger said. “Obviously, being battle-tested in a seven-game series and having to battle that adversity. We’re healthy, and we’ve got depth. We utilized our depth in that series [vs. Mimico]. I think we’re just so excited to be there, and we’re focused on the end goal, which is to win a Minto Cup.”

The Minto Cup begins this evening. Don’t miss a second of the non-stop action. If you can make it in person, buy your tickets here. If you can’t make it out the Poirier Sport & Leisure Complex, you can watch the entire tournament by buying a pass here.  

In Junior lacrosse, nothing is bigger than the Minto Cup. This is what every young kid plays for. Now is their time. Who will come out on top is anyone’s guess, but it is sure to be a tournament that will thrill lacrosse fans across the country and beyond.