Ottawa at the Canada Summer Games Day 11: Final week gets underway

(This article was first sent to subscribers of the Ottawa at the Canada Summer Games Daily Newsletter. Sign up to receive it, for free, here.)

By Dan Plouffe, Charlie Pinkerton, Mark Colley, Martin Cleary & Adamo Marinelli

Yesterday was an off day from competition at the 2022 Canada Summer Games as athletes who competed in week 1 moved out and a new set of participants arrived in Niagara Region for week 2.

So, with the break in action, we decided to seize the moment to talk about ourselves a little!

Last evening we sent you a letter from Ottawa Sports Pages Executive Director Dan Plouffe to tell you about what inspired him to create the Ottawa Sports Pages, why he believes our work is important, and details about our fundraising campaign that will run through to the end of the Games.

We are so pleased to have received a bunch of donations already (thank you so much!) for the Ottawa Sports Pages Fund. We’d appreciate it if you’d consider supporting our cause, too. Find out more at Support.OttawaSportsPages.ca/.

Now, back to where we left off – getting you set up for what’s ahead in our week 2 coverage of Ottawa at the Canada Summer Games.

2022 Games’ final week features Ottawa athletes as strong contenders for medals

The resumption of competition on Tuesday marks the beginning of the homestretch of the 2022 Canada Summer Games.

Ottawa athletes pack the schedule with six days to go, including numerous who will be keen to leave with a prize around their neck. One such group is the Ottawa-produced contingent on Team Ontario’s women’s soccer squad, which includes Rosa Maalouf, Maya Galko, Sofia Cortes-Browne and Teegan Melenhorst.

Their tournament gets underway this afternoon at 4:30 p.m. with an opening pool play game against the Yukon at the Youngs Sportsplex.

Maalouf will be one to keep an eye on, given her breakout profile-raising performance earlier this year at the Concacaf Under-17 championships in the Dominican Republic. She scored 12 times in six games, leading the tournament and helping Canada to a third-place finish.

While speaking with Sports Pages reporter Mark Colley ahead of the Canada Summer Games, Maalouf was confident.

“I’m looking forward to winning,” she said.

Ottawa sets three to women’s volleyball team

The Ottawa trio on Ontario’s women’s volleyball team are another group of players beginning competition on Tuesday that likely has high hopes for a medal finish. The group includes Audrey Goddard, of the Ottawa Fusion Volleyball Club, and Victoria Potvin and Kate Lamothe, who both are affiliated with the Ottawa Maverick Volleyball Club.

For Goddard, how the women’s volleyball squad finishes may be extra weighty, given she chose the team over going solo in her own competition. Goddard also qualified to compete in heptathlon at the Canada Summer Games. She forwent it in favour of volleyball, since the two sports’ schedules overlap in this last week of the Games.

Goddard talked to reporter Martin Cleary about her unique circumstances before the Games began.

Team Ontario’s women’s volleyball team’s first game is today at 11 a.m. at Canada Games Park against Nova Scotia.

Men’s lacrosse to try and match women’s gold

Ontario’s men’s lacrosse team, featuring Ottawa’s Tristan Caldwell, Hunter Lubiniecki, and Julien Belair, begins its tournament close to where the women’s volleyball team will wrap up their first match. The men’s lacrosse team’s opener is at Canada Games Park at 2 p.m. against Team British Columbia.

Ontario’s women’s lacrosse team set a high bar for the men by winning gold last week.

For Caldwell, matching the women’s first-place finish would also mean equaling that of his Canada Summer Games-torch-lighting partner, fellow Ottawa-native Tristan Thompson, who was one of the women’s lacrosse gold medal winners.

Ottawa athletes pack busy final week at the Canada Games

On top of those we’ve already mentioned, the last week of these Canada Summer Games will also feature Ottawa athletes competing as paddlers, cyclists, divers, runners, jumpers, and throwers.

Between now and Friday, there will be eight Rideau Canoe Club athletes competing in canoe-kayak — the most the club has ever sent to a single Canada Summer Games.

Road cyclist Lucy Hempstead has her first race on Tuesday at 10 a.m.

Diver Audrée Howes will compete over the next few days.

And between now and Saturday there will be another 11 Ottawa athletes in action in track-and-field events, including in sprints and other distance races, javelin, other throws, high jump, hurdles, and decathlon.

We’ll have much more on many of these athletes in the days ahead, but if you’re itching to learn more now, you can check out their bios on the Canada Summer Games’ website here.

You can stream most events via https://niagara2022games.ca/watch. We’ll be back in your inbox bright and early tomorrow. See you then.

(This article was first sent to subscribers of the free Ottawa at the Canada Summer Games Daily Newsletter. Sign us to receive it below!)

_{By clicking on the submit button, you consent to receive the above newsletter from the Ottawa Sports Pages. You may unsubscribe by clicking on the link at the bottom of our emails. Ottawa Sports Pages | 345 Meadowbreeze Dr., Kanata, Ont., K2M 0K3 | 613-261-5838}