The top-5 North Shore sports stories of 2019 – North Shore News

Merry Christmas, North Shore sports fans!

It’s been another great year on our diamonds and courts, rinks and pitches. Here is our annual look at the top-five sports stories of the year, as chosen by the North Shore News sports editorial board.

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Oh come all ye faithful. And keep it coming in 2020!

Field of dreams

Few sporting events held on the North Shore have the combined drama and high stakes of the unfathomable field hockey series that played out on West Vancouver’s Rutledge Field in late October.

The Canadian men’s field hockey team hosted Ireland in a two-game aggregate score series with a berth in the 2020 Olympic Games on the line. Win and you’re in, lose and you’re out, at least until 2024. What followed was as close to a miracle as you’ll ever see in sport (or as close to a tragedy if you were rooting for the Irish side).

You see, Canada was dead. Finished. The clock ran out on Game 2 with Ireland leading 6-5, setting off a celebration amongst the Irish players on the field and fans in the stands. But wait … what’s the ref doing? The series, in fact, was not over.

The final play of the game went to a video review and the officials deemed that Canada’s Jamie Wallace had been taken down by an Irish defender in the scoring zone in the final second of the game. The decision: penalty stroke for Canada.

The teams then regrouped – some equipment had already been tossed aside in celebration or despair – to see Canadian captain Scott Tupper calmly fire home a penalty stroke to tie the series 6-6, sending the teams straight into a shootout.

The shootout quickly went sideways as well for Team Canada, as Ireland scored three straight to take a commanding 3-1 lead through three rounds of shooters. From that point on it was do-or-die for Canada, and they came all the way back, scoring on their final two shots while getting strong goaltending from veteran David Carter to storm back for a 3-3 shootout tie, forcing sudden death. Finally in the seventh round the Irish shooter missed, opening the door for Canadian Adam Froese, who danced and deked in front of the Irish keeper before firing in the winning goal and touching off an epic celebration on the field and in the stands.

“I’m speechless. Absolutely speechless,” said West Vancouver native Fin Boothroyd in and amongst his celebrating teammates. “I’ve been in big games before but this is something different, this is a world of its own.”

We’ll be watching this team play in Tokyo next year, and the thousands of fans who were at that game in West Vancouver will have a special connection to these players now going for Olympic gold. 

Back in the saddle

West Vancouver’s Georgia Simmerling has made several appearances in our “best of” lists over the years, and the stories just keep getting more and more unbelievable. 2019 saw the alpine skier turned ski crosser turned track cyclist make another miracle recovery, this time following a horrific ski cross crash in 2018.

Over the past decade Simmerling has put together a stunning resume that included alpine racing at the 2010 Olympic Games in Whistler and ski cross at the 2014 Games in Sochi. She then made an unprecedented switch to track cycling and made history in 2016, becoming the first Canadian athlete to compete in three different Olympics in three different sports. In Rio Simmerling claimed her first Olympic medal, winning bronze in track cycling team pursuit.

She then got back on snow and was racing towards the 2018 Olympics when she broke both her legs in a devastating World Cup ski cross race. That injury might not have even been the worst of her career – she broke bones in her neck and back in ski cross crash in 2012 – but this latest fall forced her to retire from ski racing for good.

It didn’t, however, kill her will to compete. In fact, it only seems to have made it stronger. Simmerling attacked rehab once again, and in January made a triumphant return to competition, helping Canada capture silver in a World Cup team pursuit track cycling race.

She’s racing full speed towards the 2020 Olympic Games now – the team took back-to-back bronze medals at UCI track cycling World Cup races earlier this month – and it would surprise no one to see Simmerling appearing in these pages again 12 months from now.

She remains one of the most unique athletes the North Shore has ever seen.

Wodak moment

Many elite athletes hit their peaks in their late 20s or early 30s, but North Vancouver resident Natasha Wodak just celebrated her 38th birthday last week and she is going faster than ever.

The distance runner’s big year was punctuated by a gold-medal win and new meet record in the 10,000-metre race at the Pan Am Games held this summer in Lima, Peru. Wodak finished in a time of 31 minutes and 55.17 seconds to win gold, calling it the biggest win of her racing career.

“This one is definitely the most special,” she said. “I have never won a medal in a Games event so I just felt really good. My parents were here and I just went and saw them and it was just really special, you know, being 37 and having been doing this for so long, it’s really good.”

Wodak’s also won the Vancouver Sun Run in April, becoming the second woman in the 35-year history of the event to claim three victories. She led from start to finish to win the 10-kilometre elite women’s race in a time of 32 minutes and 38 seconds, eight seconds ahead of the second-place finisher.

Wodak also won gold at the 2019 Canadian 10,000 m Championships. Watch for her ripping off super fast laps at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.

Caps national champs

The Capilano Rugby Club’s premier women made some history in 2019, winning the inaugural Canadian Rugby Club Championship tournament for women.

Capilano claimed the national title after scoring a pair of wins in the championship tournament held Aug. 2-4 at Fletcher’s Field in Markham, Ont. The Caps first beat the Maritime champions from Charlottetown 39-14, before topping Club de Rugby de Québec (CRQ) 34-19 two days later to claim the title.

The Canadian Rugby Club Championship debuted in 2018 with a men’s tournament, hosted by Capilano Rugby Club. The 2019 version was the inaugural women’s tournament, and the event is scheduled to alternate between men’s and women’s tournaments each season.

The Canadian championship win was nice, but the toughest test for the Caps may have come in the provincial championship final against Victoria’s Westshore Valkyries held in Burnaby in May. The match was dubbed “The Battle of the Shores,” and the two squads certainly did go to battle for the entire match. 

Westshore entered the fixture as favourites, coming in as the tournament’s top seed and two-time defending champions. They had also beat Capilano in two prior tilts earlier in the season. Capilano, however, came ready to play, taking a commanding 17-0 lead in the first 25 minutes. By the middle of the second half, Westshore had battled all the way back to take a 19-17 lead.

With five minutes to go the caps won a penalty from 30 metres out, and Macy Munson blasted home a high-pressure kick to put the Caps on top for good as the team held on for a thrilling 20-19 win.

“What an honour it has been for Capilano RFC women’s program to not only win the B.C. Premiership title but to be a part of and win the inaugural Canadian National Women’s Club Championship,” said head coach An Hoang.

Capilano will forever more remain the first name etched into that new national championship trophy.

Well armed

This last sports achievement isn’t focused on one particular athlete or team but rather a group of North Shore residents who are all excelling at one particular skill: throwing a baseball.

2019 was a banner year for a number of North Shore pitchers who fired heaters around the world, including for Team Canada and on Major League mounds.

Topping the list is Rowan Wick, who has a remarkable story all his own. Wick was drafted as a power-hitting catcher but while he was in the minor leagues his cannon of an arm was moved from behind the plate onto the mound where he was transformed into a flame-throwing reliever. Before the 2019 season Wick was traded to the Chicago Cubs organization, and after bouncing back and forth between the majors and minors a bit, carved out a role as an indispensable arm in the big club’s bullpen over the summer.

Wick was used in a number of high leverage situations in August and September, even earning a pair of saves as well as five holds for the Cubs, with manager Joe Maddon calling him the “linchpin” of the Chicago bullpen in the second half of the season.

After the season MLB.com named Wick the most valuable rookie for the Cubs, as he pitched 33.1 innings for the Cubs, putting up a stellar 2.43 ERA and 1.14 WHIP, striking out 35 batters against 16 walks.

Brandon Marklund was another North Shore hurler to find success, parlaying a stint in New Zealand into a pro deal with the Kansas City Royals organization. The 23-year-old proceeded to put up ridiculous numbers for the Class-A Lexington Legends in the South Atlantic League this year, registering a miniscule 0.46 ERA, allowing just two earned runs in 39.1 innings while striking out 44 batters.

Marklund capped his year off by joining Team Canada for the WBSC Premier12 tournament in November, an event featuring the top 12 baseball nations in the world. He wasn’t the only North Shore pitcher on the team though. He was joined by well-travelled veteran Scott Richmond and 22-year-old Will McAffer, who plays in the Blue Jays organization.

One more to add as well: North Shore Twins pitcher Adam Maier, who suited up for the junior national team, was ridiculous in 2019, throwing a perfect game and ending the season having allowed just two earned runs in 58.1 innings for a record-setting ERA of 0.24. Maier earned both the league’s MVP honours and top pitcher award as the Twins went on to win the BCPBL title for the third time in the past five seasons.

A near perfect season for a Twin, three pitchers on the national team, and another one closing games for the Chicago Cubs … the North Shore certainly brought the heat in 2019. 

Honourable mentions

 North Van Wolf Pack win PJHL title in the spring, follow it up by putting up a preposterous 21-1-0-1 record to start the 2019-20 season.

 Sentinel senior girls cross-country running team wins provincial title in record-setting fashion, placing six runners in the top-25 in a race that included 220 finishers.

 New men’s and women’s records set at the Multi-Grouse Grind Challenge, with Vancouver’s Wilfrid Leblanc completing 19 Grinds in one day and North Vancouver’s Brooke Spence ripping off 18 climbs.

Top off-court stories

 Advocacy from North Vancouver soccer player Ciara McCormack leads to public outcry about the way the sport is administered.

 North Shore Sports Hall of Fame resurrected after decades of dormancy, welcoming its first new class since 1971.