The World Senior Street/Ball Hockey Championships - June 7-10, 2001

One of our own takes the All Star Team Goalie award at the World Championships

Our very own John Cowan was voted as the tournament's All Star Team Goalie over all the other team's goalies.  In one way, this makes John the best ball hockey goalie in the world.  He may now be too good to play with the rest of the BBHA membership during our regular games, or at least he may think that!  

Word from one tournament player, Tom Murray, has it that John "made an incredible save against the Germans, which I still can't believe he made; everyone was breathless when it happened, and prevented an overtime period which may have put the fate of our squad on a different track."

Check out John in action against Slovakia in the following picture

Way to go John!

BBHA Photo Gallery of World Championships

Have a look at the Worlds 2001 Photo Gallery to see pictures of the boys in action at the Worlds as well as them posing with the Pool B 1st place cup and gold medals. 

Tournament Statistics

For the final team statistics for the tournament, have a look at the following:

I bet the rest of the world will not take the BBHA so lightly next time!

Local Bermuda Newspaper Articles

Have a look at the following newspaper articles which were published after the tournament and see what they say about the success of the BBHA at the Worlds 

Final Update - June 10th, 2001 2:00pm AST

The Boys come in 5th for the Tournament with a 2-1 win over Germany!

Not only have the BBHA boys made history by scoring their first every International goal and winning their first ever International game, but they surprised everyone by ending up in 5th place, ahead of Austria, Germany and the United States!  Who would have thought that a group of beach goers from a tiny island in the middle of the North Atlantic, would have shown a few of the world's best ball hockey players how to play the game.   It would surely be the talk around the tournament and around the world of ball hockey.

How sweet these memories will be in the years to come for the BBHA boys who trained so hard and gave it their all in Toronto.  Definitely a few BBHA Hall of Fame candidates in this group!  One such candidate will be Eric Bertrand, who gave the boys the win in this game with both of the teams 2 goals.  Just as he did in the recent Spring 2001 BBHA Tournament by scoring 5 of the 6 goals in the Championship game, Eric shows his true natural talents when the team needs them.  A well done to Eric as well as the rest of the team who put support around him on the floor and on the bench!

The boys end up with a record of 3 wins and 2 losses for the tournament.  Here is the text taken from the ISBHF Tournament website:

10/06 18th Match: Bermuda - Germany 2:1

This is for sure the biggest surprise of the 2001 World Championship, that the newcomer at its first international tournament finished at the 5th place and won the Pool B.

pdate - June 9th, 2001 11:30pm AST

The BBHA Boys beat Austria 3-2 in overtime to play in the 5th place game!

The BBHA Boys are on a roll and must be really pumped after this dramatic win.  They have beaten Austria 3-2 in overtime to advance to the 5th place game.  Here is the text taken from the ISBHF Tournament website:

09/06 13th Match: Bermuda - Austria 3:2 OT

With this win Bermuda will fight for 5th place with the winner of today's last match of Germany against USA.

Update - June 8th, 2001 1:30pm AST

FORGET ALMOST WON - THEY HAVE NOW WON!!!

Our boys have done it!  They have made history again, on top of scoring the first ever BBHA goal in International play, by winning the BBHA's first ever International game.  The boys have defeated the best that the United States could send to the tournament by a convincing score of 5-2.

This win has placed the BBHA team in 3rd place in their division ahead of the United States.  They will now play Austria at 10:30am EST on Saturday, June 9th,  to see who will play in the Bronze metal game on Sunday.

Way to go guys!!

Update - June 7th, 2001 9:00pm AST

THEY ALMOST WON!!!

Our boys almost beat the Swiss national team in a 4-3 thriller in Toronto.  This has got to be one of the biggest moments in BBHA history!  Here is the text taken from the ISBHF Tournament website:

07/06 6th Match: Switzerland - Bermuda 4:3

As most of the spectators have said, this was probably the most interesting match at the 2001 championship til now.  Switzerland won in the dramatical match over Bermuda 4-3. 

The goals were scored by Eric Bertrand, Kevin Haddon-Harris and Tom Murray.  Not too many people can say they have scored a goal on Switzerland's National Ball Hockey team while playing with a team of guys from an island in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, where ice is only used to keep the drinks cool while laying on the beach.

The boys have got to be pumped now for their next game against the United States, which is on Friday night at 10:30pm AST.  

Forget about the Jamaican Bob Sled team, lets hear it for the BBHA Ball Hockey team!!

Update - June 7th, 2001 2:00pm AST

Well, the first game is over for the boys from Bermuda in the first ever International Tournament game.  Here is the text taken from the ISBHF Tournament website:

07/06 4th Match: Slovakia - Bermuda 7:0

Current World Champion has won 7:0 over team Bermuda in their first match of the national team.  First two periods were too slow for the champion, but the last period has shown the power of Slovakia.

This is a good result considering Slovakia are the reigning World Champions. 

Update - June 6th, 2001

The following article appeared in today's Bermuda Sun:

Team from Bermuda to play at World Championships

Update - June 1st, 2001

The Official Schedule has recently been made public.  Below are the division setups for the round robin games:

The game schedule for our boys from Bermuda is as follows:

1. Thursday, June 7th    @ 11:15am - against Slovakia

2. Thursday, June 7th    @ 5:00pm - against Switzerland

3. Friday, June 8th        @ 9:30pm - against USA

After these games, the boys will play at some point on Saturday to see if they will advance to the medal round.  For all the up to date scores, keep your eyes on the official tournament website:

One of the local newspapers, the Mid Ocean News, published an article about the upcoming Worlds and an introduction to the BBHA.  Follow the link below to see what they had to say:

           Mid Ocean News Article on the BBHA

For more press, check out this news release that one of the BBHA members came across on Bloomberg:

Canadian Ball Hockey Advance Scout Visits Bermuda The CBHA sent an advance scout to Bermuda to assess the strength of the BBHA team considered by many to be a surprise entry in the upcoming World Championships to be held in Toronto this June. "The BBHA squad is virtually unknown and we wanted to get a sense as to whether these guys could play or not. I only saw them at their practice facility and never did find the arena where they play their league games. It seems that its location is a jealously guarded secret. It appears that they are concentrating on shooting accuracy to give them an edge in the tourney because they practice with the nets down. I don't think they have decided on a number one goaltender because they seemed to try a lot of guys in that position. I overheard some of the guys talking about drinking plenty of Black n' Cokes and Dark n' Stormies the night before and guess that it must be some local performance enhancing health drink similar to the pickle juice used by selected NFL players. Bottom line is that these guys can play and we won't be taking them lightly."

AP 7 March 2001

Ok, this news release is not actually a real one, but since there are a strong number of Canadian players in the BBHA membership, it seemed appropriate.

Now for some good words for the team's sponsors and equipment suppliers.  The BBHA would like to thank Zurich, the Bermuda Telephone Company (BTC) and the Robin Hood for their sponsorship and Mylec for being the team's official equipment supplier.

For more information about the upcoming tournament and other news on the International Ball Hockey scene, have a look at the following sites:

International Street & Ball Hockey Federation     

Canadian Ball Hockey Association