Teams
The 2008 tournament saw twelve nations competing in the championship. Teams were split into two division: the elite "Blue Division" and the "Red Division" consisting of nations where lacrosse is still developing. The tournament consisted of round robin play within a team's division, where each team played every team in its division once. Round robin play established seedings for the following series of single elimination play-in games to compete in the "placing" or semi-final round.
The Blue Division was composed of the following six elite teams: the United States had won each of the International Lacrosse Federation's Under-19 World Lacrosse Championship tournaments since its inception in 1988, Canada led by head coach Gary Gait, Iroquois Nationals, this Native American team is only sanctioned to compete in lacrosse internationally, the up and coming England team, Australia, who won the bronze medal in 2003, and Japan, who moved up to the Blue Division after going undefeated in the Red Division in 2003.
The Red Division included three nations making their first appearance in an Under–19 World Lacrosse Championship tournament. Bermuda, Finland, and Scotland are making their first appearance in the tournament. The nations of Wales and South Korea are making their second appearances in the Under-19 World Lacrosse Championship. Germany is also participating, but was granted a waiver by the ILF to field a team consisting of Under-21 year olds.
Read more about this topic: 2008 ILF Men's U-19 World Lacrosse Championship
Famous quotes containing the word teams:
“A sturdy lad from New Hampshire or Vermont who in turn tries all the professions, who teams it, farms it, peddles, keeps a school, preaches, edits a newspaper, goes to Congress, buys a township, and so forth, in successive years, and always like a cat falls on his feet, is worth a hundred of these city dolls. He walks abreast with his days and feels no shame in not “studying a profession,” for he does not postpone his life, but lives already.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)