The Ladner Pioneers are steamrolling towards another West Coast Senior Lacrosse Association championship, but it won’t be until late August when they will learn just how strong they are.
The Pioneers improved to 10-1 on the season with a 19-1 home floor blitzing of the New West Salmonbellies.
They have just three games regular season games remaining and their road to a third straight WCSLA title is expected to brief as well. A year ago they needed just three games to earn playoff honours after going uncontested in the semi-finals and sweeping the North Shore Indians in a best-of-five series.
It will set the stage to head east to defend their national championship at the President’s Cup in Oakville, Ont. starting on Aug. 27. The week-long tournament typically features at least six champions from leagues across the country as well as the hosts. The Oakville Rock currently lead the Ontario league with a 9-1 record and as expected has a line-up loaded with pro talent including 25-year-old Georgia Swarm standout Ryan Lanchbury and Cam Milligan who came out west in the summer of 2016 to help the Delta Islanders win their first-ever league title.
Pioneers head coach Ross Frehlick doesn’t have his championship roster intact from a year ago, but it’s close and some would say even better.
Hometown standout and Vancouver Warriors veteran Logan Schuss is recovering from knee surgery, but was planning to return to the Western Lacrosse Association this summer anyways. Longtime Pioneer Tyler Kirkby opted to not play this season.
Still, Frehlick has assembled a line-up with plenty of pro talent including reigning league MVP and scoring champion Tyler Pace. The Calgary Roughnecks standout has picked up where he left off a year ago with 80 points in just 10 games. Roughnecks’ teammate Zach Herreweyers has 41 points in eight games, while Ryan Benesch recently returned to B.C. and is showing once again why he is among the National Lacrosse League all-time leading scorers with 20 points in four games.
Frehlick has also added former Warrior and Aldergrove native James Rahe who sits second in league scoring with 59 points. Alberta native Dean Fairall has stayed on the west coast to suit-up for Ladner after playing for the Warriors last season.
The back end is loaded with standouts Matt Beers, Jeff Cornwall and Sam Clare anchoring the defence while their biggest addition of all came in goal with the signing of 2023 NLL MVP Christian Del Bianco. He has a 7-0 record with 4.87 goals against average.
