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22 + WATERLOO CHRONICLE * Wednesday, August 1. 2007 www wgsa.com REP COACHES FOR 2008 Waterloo Minor Girls Softball is looking for rep coaches for the 2008 season. WMGSA has rep teams at the Mite, Squirt, Novice, Bantam and Midget levels. If you are interested, please contact the office as soon as possible for more information and/or an appliâ€" cation. The deadline for rep coaches‘ applications is August 8 and the selection process will begin immediately following this date. All applicants should be available and prepared with &o?c‘hing philosophy and references for interviews between August 9â€"16 Saturday, August 18th; 6:45 pm Centennial Stadium; Kitchener, ON www.newwaterloobandfestival.ca mgsa.com _ 519â€"747â€"0430 office@wmgs 500 Parkside Drive, Waterioo N2L 534 +o td a office@wmgsa.com CENTRE® The Waterloo Wildhawks held their annual Elite boys basketbail camp for upâ€"andâ€"coming roundball talent at RIM Park last week. More than 66 campers from across the province and beyond took part in the annual camp that has seen grads go on to play in the U.S. and Canada. Taking part in the highlyâ€" charged atmosphere last Thursday were Forest Heights‘ Taylor McNaughton, left, trying to get the ball from Blueâ€" vale‘s Srdjan Pejicic in a battle for a loose ball. Pejicic, who helped lead the Knights to the WCSSAA senior boys basâ€" ketball finals last year, kept the bail but couldn‘t help his squad win the contest. Canadian Open should wake up the Bear ump me in with the Royal Canadiâ€" I an Golf Association and a whole unch of bigâ€"name U.S. pro tour players who didn‘t like last week‘s date for the Canadian Open golf champiâ€" onship tournament at the Angus Glen course in the Toronto suburb of Markham. Although I had credentials to go watch and report on the antics of such stars as winner Jim Furyk and a couple of our Canadian hopefuls, Mike Weir and Stephen Ames, a busy schedule of playing golf and grandfatherly duties made it impossible for me to squeeze in even one day at the Open. And it was kind of sad in one respect because it was a mere 50 years earlier that I had attended my very first Canaâ€" dian Open when it was played on the wonderful Westmount golf course straddling the boundary of Kitchener and Waterloo. 1 was a rookie newspaper guy in my hometown of Niagara Falls and I just came to see some of the stars of that era and I didn‘t actually "cover" the event. Ironically, that‘s pretty much the case today in my retirement from fullâ€" time reporting duties. 1 don‘t do the dayâ€"toâ€"day stuff, merely show up, meet and greet old buddies in the business and then watch a variety of players from various vantage points on the courses. And when that‘s over, I churn out this deathless prose â€" as time will prove â€" that will be the harbinger of good things for the third oldest pro golf championship in the world. You know where I‘m headed with this, right? You bet, my continued plea for Research In Motion to take over title sponsorship of the event. But to that end, I‘m adding a new aspect to the plan. Not only should RIM bosses Jim Balsillie and/or Mike Lazaridis save our national puttâ€"putt event, the shootout should find a home at the Whistle Bear golf club near the western edge of Cambridge. 1 know that there‘s little or no hope of that ever happening, based on the mindset of some that Toronto is the Playing keep away 808 VRBANAC PHOTO centre of the universe, but that doesn‘t mean I won‘t keep flogging the idea, just as I have with the RIM scheme which I first launched last September. Based on the numbers â€" and I don‘t mean those posted on the scoreboard by Furyk and others â€" attendance was down at the 2007 Open. That, of course, is to be expected when only four of the top 20 players in the world deem it important enough to show up for and coming as it did right after the British Open in Scotland. However, 1 believe that with the same field of competitors and at the same point in the schedule, the Open would have drawn much more than the reported total of little over 91,000 at Angus Glen had it been played at the No, we‘re not metro Hogtown but we have some of the best golf fans in the world in a 50â€"mile radius around Waterâ€" loo Region and knowing the simple fact that you would have been able to park your car and "walk" to the course entrance probably would have added thousands and thousands to the turnout. A couple of years ago, before the powersâ€"thatâ€"be shot down Whistle Bear coâ€"owner Emilio Cabral‘s hopes of actuâ€" ally landing the championship at his fine course, he outlined to me how he had potential access to acres and acres of land around his course that would have been perfect for parking. It would eliminate the tiresome drudgery of getâ€" ting bussed to and from the Open locaâ€" tion as has been the case at Angus, Glen Abbey and the two earlier years at the Hamilton Golf Club in the former town of Ancaster. Of course, I‘m old enough to rememâ€" ber driving to the Abbey in Oakville, parking in a public lot near the back end of the course and walking less than five minutes to get on the site. That just doesn‘t happen anymore at the atoreâ€" mentioned courses but it still could at the Bear. As for the competition itself, well, it was interesting. It didn‘t have the drama of the U.K. or the U.S. Opens but it was interesting for the most part and I have always liked the way Furyk has handled himself. Just coming back to defend his title was the kind of class act I expect from Furyk. Although only four of 20 Canadians made the halfway cut to play the final two rounds, we still got to see lots of Ames and Weir, and Brantford‘s favourite son David Hearn, on TV. Without Tiger and Phil in the field, I give high marks to U.S. television netâ€" work CBS for documenting plenty of Canadian content and special features, including the most unusual feature of comparing Weir‘s lefthanded swing to late Canadian golf legend George Knudâ€" son, who was righthanded. It was differâ€" ent, to say the least. Yes, I‘m sorry I missed any inâ€"person action at this year‘s Open but I hope to remedy that next year when it‘s back in Oakville at the Abbey, the course I conâ€" stantly refer to as the "most overrated" in Canada. What the hell. Different strokes for different folks. Bill (Skip) Johns retired from fullâ€" time sportswriting in 2002 and can be reached at skipschips@golden.net.