• Canada finishes tournament with 5 wins, 1 loss
• USA, Canada, and Colombia qualify for Tokyo 2020

(August 31, 2019 – LIMA, PERU) The Canadian Men’s Wheelchair Basketball team finish Lima 2019 with silver, a 5-1 record, and a berth into the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics. The USA defeated them 76-43 to win the gold medal, while Colombia finished third.

With the top three teams in the tournament earning berths into the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games, both Canada and the USA already punched their tickets to next year’s best-on-best tournament. Colombia secured the third and final qualification spot for the Americas zone when they defeated Argentina 58-51 and won Lima 2019 bronze.

“We are happy but not satisfied with tonight, so we have to work harder for next year. It’s like a mountain,” explained co-captain David Eng. “We had a couple of goals for each year from Rio to Tokyo and we have been meeting our benchmarks. The marks that we wanted and we set for ourselves. So, we are on schedule and we are right where we want. And I think that just gives us a little more fire to get to the peak where there is a little less oxygen on the peak of the mountain.”

“I think we have to take this game and not rest on it. Maybe take a week off or two, but we have to get back into it. We can’t fall back, we have to keep climbing, and climbing, and climbing. There is no time to rest, we have to keep improving,” said Eng.

Canada struggled to find their offensive flair early shooting merely 27% from the field compared to the USA who hit 32-of-66 (48%). Canada managed to connect on just one of their first ten attempts, and their opponent leveraged the chance to quickly take a 14-4 lead by midway through the first quarter. The Canucks began chipping away at the lead and found themselves down by seven points (18-11) after one period of play. By halftime the American lead grew to 35-23.

The USA outscored Canada 26-9 in the third quarter, effectively putting things out of reach for Canada, and cruised to the victory.

USA’s Joshua Turek led all players with 18 points, while teammates Matthew Scott and Michael Paye had 13 and 10 points respectively. On the Canadian side Nik Goncin of Regina, Sask. and Patrick Anderson of Fergus, Ont. had 12 and 11 points.

“Losing hurts. Sometimes you forget, but I remembered that,” said Anderson. “They are a finished product, they are a polished product, and they are very good. They showed us where the bar is at, between them and Great Britain. We will get some great video out of it and get a sense of their speed and athleticism and have that bar in front of us as we start preparing this fall,” said Anderson.

It was Canada’s sixth consecutive podium appearance having won gold in 2003, silver in 1999, 2007 and 2015 and bronze in 2011. The Parapan Am tournament is the direct qualifier for the 2020 Tokyo Paralympic Games.

On the women’s side, Canada defeated the USA 67-64 to win gold and finish the tournament with an unblemished 5-0 record. Brazil captured the bronze medal.

Men’s Final Results:

1 – USA
2 – Canada
3 – Colombia
4 – Argentina
5 – Brazil
6 – Puerto Rico
7 – Mexico
8 – Peru

Canada’s Results:
• August 24: Canada (Women) 83 vs. Colombia 6 – win
• August 25: Canada (Men) 64 vs. Colombia 51 – win
• August 25: Canada (Women) 82 vs. Argentina 25 – win
• August 26: Canada (Men) 74 vs. Mexico 48 – win
• August 27: Canada (Women) 79 vs. Mexico 21 – win
• August 27: Canada (Men) 79 vs. Argentina 73 – win

• August 28: Quarter-finals – Canada (Men) 78 vs. Peru 31 – win
• August 29: Semifinals – Canada (Women) 61 vs Brazil 40 -win
• August 30: Semifinals – Canada (Men) 62 vs Colombia 42 -win

• August 30: Final – Canada (Women) 67 vs USA 64 – win
• August 31: Final – Canada (Men) 43 vs USA 76 – loss

Media Resources:

To access photos click here

To access media notes click here

To access stats click here

To access athlete bios click here

About the Canadian Paralympic Committee: Paralympic.ca

About Wheelchair Basketball Canada: WheelchairBasketball.ca

About Lima 2019

The Lima 2019 Parapan American Games will take place August 23 to September 1 in Peru and will surpass Toronto 2015 as the largest Parapan Am Games ever with a record 1,850 athletes set to participate. Canada is expecting to send a team of approximately 152 athletes and competition partners in 13 sports. The Canadian Paralympic Committee will announce the official full team heading to the Games later this month.

MEDIA CONTACTS

Jody Kingsbury
Lima 2019 Media Attaché, Wheelchair Basketball
Director, Marketing and Communications
Wheelchair Basketball Canada
jkingsbury@wheelchairbasketball.ca
Whatsapp: 613-851-2337
Lima cell: +51 920 342747

Nicole Watts
Manager, Public Relations
Canadian Paralympic Committee
nwatts@paralympic.caWhatsapp: 1-613-462-2700
Lima Cell: +51 920 342 739