Women's Play All Over Ontario!

The women’s have been together for two years now, this summer will be our third season and year. And over the past two years we have played all over Ontario and counting, when playing teams that are outside of the GTA it gives us the ability to see how these different cities play Rugby. We have played: Orillia, Georgian Bay, Barrie, Oakville, Toronto, Cobourg, Lindsay, and even our own team, Mississauga.

Each season we played three different teams, three times each. By the end of the season everyone on the opposite team knew their tricks, so it was always a challenge to change our strategy so they wouldn’t clue in.
Our very first game was against Orillia and they beat us bad, this was because we just weren’t ready for our first game because we were new, this however, made Orillia the team to beat, the second time we played them they defiantly were not going to beat us, not this time. We had our head in the game and brutally beat them; they defiantly didn’t see that coming.

It’s hard to play different teams in their home town because there will always be that referee that say that they are not from there, but we all know that they are rooting for the home team to win, and the ref makes so many calls, some appropriate and some are not necessary.

The previous summer Orillia didn’t have enough girls who were able to play during the summer so they didn’t have team, the girls who wanted to play for Orillia, joined Barrie. This would the second year we played this team, by the end of it, it was like we knew each other. Familiar faces made it that much more enjoyable because they knew that our team was good, and it made us more intimidating, which I loved.

This summer of 2012, I hope that we play a couple of the same teams but also play different cities to see what more is out there, and that just adds to the list of the teams we have beat!

Fundraising for the Men’s’ Tour!

Just like every Rugby team, everyone wants to go and experience Rugby in its original habitat, where it originated from, and how the REAL Rugby stars play. Steetsville Secondary School have been traveling to Wales, England, and numerous of other places. Every other year a team from England (one of the places they have traveled) would come to Canada and would live with students from the Streetsville Rugby team and experience our wonderful country and the Streetsville Rugby team would do the same in England. However, this was only the boys’ team; the girls never have had enough people to go on their team to go.

Because Mississauga Blues was made in Streetsville, Mike Curran thought it would be a great idea for the Senior Men’s to go on tour to England and Wales in August 2012, the summer coming up. The past summer all of the men have be rubbing it in our faces that they are going on tour and the women aren’t. However, we are happy for them and hope they have fun, but sooner or later, the women will go, and hopefully it will be sooner than later!
The date is coming close and in order to raise some money for the occasion, the Blues team have come up with some ways to raise money, but have fun while doing it. The fist event was the Fundraising Poker Night; it was a great success, good time and a good party. Although, they didn’t raise as much money as they hoped, they raised a good amount, and any contribution is a great one. They have upcoming events, another poker night on February 21st and a Dinner Dance in early June. We hope that this will help to raise money for jerseys, and air travel.

This isn’t the first time the Blues is doing this, so they do have some experience in the field. The U18 girl’s team went to England and Wales last year in March, they had the best time of their life, and they lived with a bunch of different people while they were site seeing through all the different towns. Now we hope that the men will have as much fun as the girls did!!

There's No TEAM Without the COACH!

With each sport the person who you look up to is your coach, they are the person who teaches you everything you know, and I am happy to say that each and every Blues team have the greatest most experience coaches ever.

Mississauga Blues run 14 apply game experiences, all coaches are certified and we have over 20 wonderful and talented coaches in our club. There are so many coaches in our club that it would take me forever to talk about each one, so for the purpose of this blog I am going to talk about the Senior Men and Senior Women’s coaches from the past couple years.

Mike Curran is the coach for the Men’s team, he is a great coach; I know this from experience because he helped coach the Streetsville Secondary Varsity girls’ team and he helps the Women’s team from time to time. He is very well educated and loves Rugby; he has even played some games on the Men’s team as well! When it comes to a big team with big guys everyone may needs some help, and Blair Jones is perfect for that, he is the team manager for the Men’s team and always there to help (his daughter is on the U18 team) he also loves the game and very dedicated to the sport.

The Senior Women’s team has only been a team for two years now, and we have had the most amazing coach, Matt Piemontese is a great coach, he is there rain or shine and is very dedicated to the sport as well; he even runs the drills with us! “Dedication at its finest,” he is a teacher at Philip Pocock Secondary School and coaches the girls team there as well. However, he is now coaching the Sheridan College Women’s Rugby team and wants to put more time and effort on them this summer, but, he will step in and help the Women’s team once and a while and work with the U18 girls more. We are all very upset that he will no longer be a coach for us, but we know that where ever he coaches, that team will be great! We did come in first place both years you know!

Although, Matt is leaving us; we have two excellent coaches here to help. Keith Wilkinson and Jill Zonneveld are now our new coaches. Keith is a NCCP master learning felicitator and he is also a former National Canadian coach and player! He is very knowledgeable and knows Rugby from head to toe, I’m sure that he will be a great with our team. Jill is formally and IRB Women’s Rugby Counsel, she is a very nice and intelligent lady, but she can also kick some butt! Both she and Keith have been working together and have coached the U16s in the past. Our team is very excited for both of them to help. The season of 2012 will be a great one!

With a great coach there is a great team, we love every one of them!

Exchange Jerseys for Prom Dresses for Breast Cancer!

A typical Rugby uniform is a jersey, shorts, and a mouth guard; so when putting girls who are battered up and dirty in a PROM DRESS makes it that much more fun. For a couple of years Mississauga Blues have been a part of this Prom Dress Rugby game to help raise money for Brest Cancer, it’s easy to raise money when people are dedicated to the sport and common who doesn’t want to watch people dress up in extravagant prom dresses and play Rugby! The Oakville Rugby Crusaders Club or “CRU” had ran this program for a couple years, and in 2009 they invited Mississauga Blues to join then and help organize this wonderful program to help them raise money for a great cause.

In 2009 it was only the under 18 girls who played each other and they raised a couple thousand dollars for the charity, the weather was wonderful and everyone had a great time. In 2010 instead of one game, we had two games which made it more enjoyable. It was no problem at all to ask the under 15 and the senior women to help out and make this event more fun and to raise more money. They sold t-shirts, food, and drinks and ended up raising a whopping $20,000!!!

The summer of 2011 Mississauga Blues and Oakville Crusaders were unable to sponsor the event again due to the scheduling with the men’s and women’s Ontario teams. There are numerous players in the Mississauga Blues club who are also on the Ontario team.

The Breast Cancer Prom Dress Rugby game for summers of 2009 and 2010 was a great success and for an amazing cause, and we hope to have one again in the summer of 2012!

There is a First for Everything!

Now I think that the title speaks for its self when I say that there is a first for everything! The Senior Women’s team places FIRST in their FIRST year as a senior team. It took a while to get a team together; Mike Curran was messaging everyone to join. I’ll be honest it took me a while even though I loved the sport, it was the committing factor that I was unsure of, but when I knew that my little sister was playing Rugby at her school, I just had to join and when I did I never regretted it.

During the season we played four different teams, and each team we played twice. By the championships we won six games and lost two and in the end our enemy was Orillia. They were the first and last team we played against for the 2010 season. Our first game was against them, and they happen to beat us 22-12 (only because we didn’t know what to expect) and when the second time came around we beat them and they didn’t see it coming by a high score of 34-0. By the end of the season, it so happen to be that Orillia was our competition.

The game was so intense I was even unsure of what the outcome was going to be, we all wanted to win and there was no question on loosing. By half time they were winning by a try and a kick and we just had a try. It was all or nothing, and by the end... WE WON! The end score was 14-13 a close game but well earned! Although, we didn’t get any medals; we got something more important our pride. The underdogs came to the top, and we plan on staying there.

Below is an article from the Mississauga News... Check it out!
http://www.mississauga.com/mississauga/article/870427

Mississauga Blues Senior Womens Almost Take the Gold

Well the 2011 season for the senior women’s team was a great one with only 2 loses out of 8 and one default win; we were so close to coming out with a win. For the whole season has been a tough one, we worked hard to get where we are today and we always show that on the field. As much as we wanted to go out and have fun we always wanted to come out with a big win. Nothing is better than coming out with a win and going out with our teammates for some winning drinks! Although, we came out first place in our division at the end of our season, like every other team I’m sure, we wanted to move up to the next division for next year. We ended up playing against the Toronto Nomads who were last place in the A division; so right above us. It was a tough game for sure, to keep things real here, the creamed us with a brutal score of 43-13. Ending with a loss has put us in the same division for next year. I personally wanted to stay in our division because if the last place team beat us to bad the first place team is probably amazing! And I would rather win then lose to be honest. This hasn’t changed the way we look at things, we always want to win and with a couple losses here and there, it just makes our team stronger with a stronger bond that no one can break. There’s always next year, and I know for sure that there will be no backing down for us to come back to the top once again!

What is Mississauga Blues?

Hello everyone!
Thank you for visiting my blog, you are probably wondering what is Mississauga Blues? And where did it start? Well I’m about to tell you, Mississauga Blues started about 6 years ago, Mike Curran the founder and creator of Mississauga Blues was so dedicated to rugby and wanted girls and boys to have extracurricular activities to do during the summer. Over the past 6 years this league has grown greatly, I am personally on the Senior Women’s Team that only has been a team for 2 years. Being on this team has changed me greatly, I love it, and it keeps me active and involved with the Mississauga Community. There are different teams of all ages, under 16 (for girls and boys) under 18 (for girls and boys) Senior Men, and Senior Women. I’ve been playing rugby for six years now, four years on Streetsville Secondary varsity girls’ team and two years on the Mississauga Blues team and I don’t think that I will stop playing rugby until my body literally gives out. It gives me this adrenaline that I can’t explain; I feel like I can do anything and achieve anything. My coach Matt Peamontize has given me and my teammates the courage that we can do better. For the past 2 years the senior women have been very successful; in 2010 the first year for the senior women’s team, won the championships against Orillia and in 2011 the senior women’s team came first place in our B division. It just goes to show that if one is passionate about a sport they will go to extremes to come to the top.