Cody Caldwell and Team Canada Bring Home 5th Place in Wheelchair Rugby

Peterborough’s Cody Caldwell and Team Canada beat France 57-49 on Saturday to finish in 5th place in Wheelchair Rugby at the Tokyo Paralympic Games.

Caldwell racked up 10 tries at the Tokyo Paralympics.

After losing their first two matches by less than a total of seven points to Great Britain and the United States, Team Canada bounced back with two consecutive wins to finish the tournament.

Caldwell logged 5:23 minutes of play time and scored one try.

Canada’s Michael Whitehead and Zac Madell were able to combine for 39 tries, making them the top scorers of their final game.

Heading into this tournament Team Canada had medal hopes. After sweeping away the competition in every Paralympic qualification match, things were looking up for the team.

Team Canada was put in group B, which consisted of two of the top three teams in the tournament, USA and Great Britain.

“They hate it, it was obvious, we were in the toughest pool, we know we should be vying for a medal,” said coach Dave Willsie in a press conference. “We took it upon ourselves, we have a lot of men in that change room, they wanted to make a statement in this last game, and that’s what we did. We stuck it to France. It wasn’t even close, and we are elite, even though we don’t have a medal to show for it.”

Canada’s next international competition is the American Zonals, taking place in Colombia this December.

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