Twenty-two European teams vying for 11 spots in next year’s world championship in San Diego
Wroc?aw, POLAND – The road to San Diego 2023 begins here today, with the start of the 2022 European Lacrosse Qualifier for the Men’s World Championship. The 22-team event features 55 games taking place at the Wroc?aw University of Health and Sport Sciences through April 16, and marks the first continental qualifier for the men’s world championship set to take place next year in San Diego, California, USA.
The top 30 men’s field lacrosse teams in the world will compete in the 2023 World Lacrosse Men’s Championship – the 14th edition of the event – with 11 being determined via this week’s qualifier.
World Lacrosse CEO Jim Scherr said: “We are expecting an incredibly high level of competition this week as some of the finest European men’s lacrosse teams vie for a spot in next year’s world championship. A lot is at stake as we anticipate that San Diego will be the best men’s championship we’ve hosted to-date and will hopefully come on the heels of lacrosse regaining its place on the Olympic program.”
European Lacrosse Federation President Steph Migchelsen said: “This event is extraordinarily important to the European Lacrosse community; these are all high stakes games, with every single win impacting qualification for the world championship in 2023. We’re also all thrilled to be back together and returning to elite level lacrosse competition.”
Teams have been seeded into four groups for round-robin play. The top two teams from each group will book their tickets to San Diego, along with the top three third-place finishers. They will join five other European teams that earned direct qualification to the world championship.
The top 10 eligible teams from the 2018 World Lacrosse Men’s Championship automatically qualified for the 2023 event: United States, Canada, Haudenosaunee (formerly Iroquois), Australia, England, Japan, Israel, Germany, Scotland and Ireland. This will be the first men’s world championship in which all participating National Federations are required to be full members of World Lacrosse; provisional members are no longer eligible for world-level competition.
The Wroc?aw event includes seven top-20 teams, based on results of the 2018 World Championship: Wales (14), Finland (15), Italy (16), Norway (17), Latvia (18), Greece (19) and Switzerland (20). The 22 competing teams are among 34 European members of World Lacrosse.
All 55 games of the 2022 European Lacrosse Qualifier will be streamed live via LaxTV.eu. Additional information, including a full schedule can be found at EuropeanLacrosse.org and via the event’s Facebook page.
Photo Credit: ShutterLax.com/Marek Stor
