IFAF Jr World Championships
Teams from Canada, US, Mexico, Germany, Japan, Sweden, New Zealand (wear uniforms identical to the all-blacks), and France are playing in a tournament in Canton, Ohio at the hall of fame stadium. (3 games each)
These are all kids 17-19 years old.
The US team is made up of 19 and younger kids, they are all incoming Freshmen on loan/volunteered by their college coaches.
Some big names there, an O-lineman and LB who will play for Ohio State are there. Virginia Tech's #1 recruit for 09 is the starting RB ... guys from Baylor and Texas A&M, Ole Miss etc.
The US won their first game 78-0 vs France, then beat Mexico 55-0.
The surprise team is Japan who plays a spread-option offense and beat Germany 10-7 while narrowly losing to Canada 38-35.
Japan has by far the best passing game except the US of course. Their QB is 6-2 205 and can scramble as well.
Their coach leads a HS in Japan that has won 5 of the last 8 national HS football titles in Japan.
They are now playing Mexico for the 3rd place medal.
New Zealand's fierce all-black look alike uniform don't mean a lot here though, they've lost all their games and have only scored 2 TDs with their old school wishbone offense.
France kinda sucks, so does Sweden, the Germans are physically the biggest team there but they kinda suck too.
The best Teams are Japan, Canada, and obviously the USA who have given up 50 yards total in two games on defense.
The US is going to play Canada for the title 7/5/09
This whole tournament is a relaunching of the old NFL Global Junior Championship with a lot bigger scope and financial/talent backing.
[ Edited by cestmoi on Jul 4, 2009 at 4:20 PM ]