If you aren’t neck-deep in the lacrosse game, you might not have been aware that the biggest soap opera in all of sports was going on in Canada over the last three days. Indeed, these last 72 or so hours have been pretty wild in our friendly federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy neighbor to the north. Nevertheless, it appears as the craziness has subsided as Game 2 of the Minto Cup will be played tonight.

Now I know many of you are not up to speed on this story, as the Minto Cup isn’t that big here in America and there are a lot of moving parts in this saga. Indeed, it has been quite difficult even for us to keep up with everything, as official statements regarding what was going on weren’t plentiful. But I am going to do my best piecing this whole thing together for you.

What is the Minto Cup?

Created in 1901, the Minto Cup is a coveted Canadian trophy awarded annually to the champion junior men’s box lacrosse team of Canada. Box lacrosse is a big deal in the Great White North, and the Minto Cup is one of the biggest and most hotly contested tournaments in the entire country. This year has been no different as teams have competed spiritedly during the tournament. You can find the official website here.

Ok, So What happened?

This week is the Minto Cup final featuring the Coquitlam Adanacs and the Brampton Excelsiorsm. Coquitlam beat Brampton 11-9 in Game 1 on Tuesday. While the game was close and entertaining, the real fireworks and the proximate cause of this entire drama occurred at the end of Tuesday’s game. Allegedly, and I use that word very carefully, Brampton’s head coach and star player got into it with one or more refs after the game, words were exchanged, and both were assessed penalties for abuse of an official. The Brampton player in the middle of this whole saga is Jeff Teat of Cornell.

Details about what happened are difficult to come by. Additionally, it is hard to even figure out when the penalties actually occurred. Lax Philly put up a post on Wednesday that stated the incident that led to the penalties occurred after the game. However, this morning the Calgary Sun posted that the incident occurred with 3 seconds left in the game on Tuesday night.

Excelsiors head coach Dan Teat and captain Jeff Teat — the team’s leading scorer with 40 goals and 72 assists heading into the Minto Cup — were both assessed match penalties with less than three seconds left in Tuesday’s first game of the best-of-five championship series for alleged abuse of an official.

The Calgary Sun article is very interesting as it is the only publication I’ve found that actually has a timestamp as to when the incident occurred. It is also very interesting because there is no mention of any end of game or post-game penalties in the box score.

Shortly after the game ended on Tuesday, NLL play-by-play announcer Jake Elliot Tweeted out that Jeff and Dan Teat were suspended for the next three games of the series, including Game 2, which was supposed to be played on Wednesday night

So this is where the story really gets going. Match penalties suspensions are supposed to be automatic with no appeals .... except for “factual error.”

On Wednesday evening Jeff and Dan Teat appealed their suspensions. The appeal was heard mere hours before the game was supposed to begin. With everyone waiting for a resolution, the game ended up being delayed as the parties were still trying to find an agreement well after the official start time. Unfortunately, the Minto Cup official Twitter account didn’t really provide much clarity.

There was a lot of innuendo and speculation on Twitter, but it wasn’t until the Brampton official Twitter account Tweeted that Jeff Teat was playing that it seemed like things were settling down and a resolution had been found.

So Jeff Played And All Was Well?

Well, not exactly. Actually, the exact opposite of that happened. Upon hearing that Jeff Teat was going to be allowed to play the refs assigned to the game refused to come out of the locker room. Again, from the Calgary Sun:

With match penalties come automatic three-game suspensions. Those bans to each of the Teats were subsequently upheld Wednesday by the discipline committee at the Minto Cup. But the Excelsiors then appealed the suspensions later Wednesday. “The discipline committee heard their comments, and the discipline committee put it in hold mode,” Gibson said. “Subsequent to that, the referees got wind of it and they decided they weren’t going to go out on the floor until things were resolved. It wasn’t going to get resolved (Wednesday night).

So with the refs refusing to come out of the locker room and with everyone waiting for an official comment, the Minto Cup Twitter account dropped the news late last night that Game 2 was canceled and there was no update as to when it would be rescheduled.

They Canceled The Game?!

Yep.

So What’s Happening Now?

The parties were trying to figure out a solution all day today. Complicating the matter were reports that the refs were unwilling to budge and that other tournaments were in danger of cancelation as well.

A little over an an hour ago Tweets popped up on Twitter that the game was going to be played tonight and that Jeff Teat would be in the line-up.

Those Tweets were right on the money as the Minto Cup Twitter account finally Tweeted out about an hour ago that the game would be played tonight, Jeff Teat will be in the lineup, and that a joint statement would be released with full details. So it looks like everyone finally came to their senses and figured out a solution. It will be interesting to read the official statement once it is online. I’ll update this post after it is released.