Wilmot Wild

The Wilmot Wild are a Canadian junior box lacrosse team from Baden, Ontario, Canada within Township of Wilmot. The Wild play in the Ontario Junior C Lacrosse League within the Ontario Lacrosse Association. Their home arena is the Wilmot Recreation Complex.

History

Formed in 2011, the Wilmot Wild debut season in the OJCLL was a success - qualifying for the West Division final. After a lackluster regular season at 4-12, the Wild stormed through the playoffs knocking off the Hamilton Bengals and Caledon Bandits to move to the Conference final. The Wild would drop the final in 4 games to the Halton Hills Bull Dogs but made their mark as a team to be reckoned with.

In 2012 the Wild's regular season record (6-8-2) improved but their playoff fate would not. The Wild would lose in the first round and it was decided that a coaching change was needed.

2013 would see the introduction of the new coaching staff led by veteran Head Coach Greg Hummel. Hummel has coached at all levels of Jr-Mjr lacrosse and boasts 2 national titles at the OLA Senior B Lacrosse League level with the Kitchener-Waterloo Kodiaks. Hummel would bring in Jamie Diebolt and Kevin Miller and the success on the floor was immediate. The Wild jumped out to an 8-1 start in the regular season and looked to be on cruise control until 7 straight losses put them into the playoffs with an 8-8 record. The Wild would sweep the Fergus Thistles before losing in the semi finals.

In their 4th season, the Wild saw Diebolt take on the GM role and again the regular season record improved. The Wild would claim top spot in the West with a 12-4 record and would defeat the Hamilton Bengals in 2 straight games to head to the semi finals again. The Wild would not succeed in surpassing their best finish and would fall short just prior to the big show.

2015 would prove to be a wild and crazy one as the boys would finish the season with a 14-2 regular season record. A league ruling however would see those 2 defeats overturned in the Wild's favour and finish them with a 16-0 record.^[1] Wilmot would sweep the 2 game opening round series against the Mimico Mountaineers before facing the now 7th place Six Nations Warriors. In the division semifinals the Wild would face the Warriors, who despite going 16-0 on the floor were seeded seventh after forfeiting 13 of those victories. Six Nations eliminated the Wild in three-straight games.^[2]

The 2016 season would prove to be the finest in Wild franchise history to date as the Wild would finish tied for top spot in the West with a sparkling 14-2 record in the regular season. With Diebolt now taking on the role as Head Coach/GM, he would lead the Wild to an impressive 8-1 record in the West finals en route to their first Meredith Cup appearance. In spite of some stellar individual performances the Wild were no match for the Clarington Shamrox who swept the Wild 4-0 to take their 4th Meredith Cup title.

In 2017, the Wild were looking to build on their success from 2016 and with many returning veterans felt they had the team to go back to the Cup. The Wild would finish the regular season with an 11-5 record under Coach Jamie Diebolt and after sweeping the Mimico Mountaineers in the first round would find themselves being swept by the Fergus Thistles in the Western Semi Final match. Sweet justice for the Thistles who were swept by the Wild in the 2016 to end their season.

2018 would see some personnel changes as KW native Rick Windl would take over the helm as Head Coach and Ryan Fitton would take over the GM duties. The Wild would finish the regular season in first place with a 13-3 record and would sweep the Caldeon Bandits in round one and Fergus Thistles in round two on their way to meet Six Nations in the Conference Final.

Season-by-season results

Note: GP = Games played, W = Wins, L = Losses, T = Ties, Pts = Points, GF = Goals for, GA = Goals against

References

External links

• Official website
• Facebook