Tonight's PLPA Spotlight features Cam Woods of the Albany Attack. Cam a
second year player with the Attack was named Captain of the squad just prior
to the 2001 season replacing a retired Darris Kilgour. Albany faced the
Ottawa Rebel tonight in front of a loud crowd, and notched their first win
on opening night by a score of 14-7. Cam picked up a goal in tonight's game
and Saul Davidson up with him after the contest...
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Cam, tonight we have to start with the obvious, your new addition to
your uniform this year. You're now wearing the Captains "C" for the Attack
this season. Tell us a bit about that..
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Well Terry asked me to be the captain pretty much before the season
started. It took me off guard really, I wasn't expecting it. We had a talk
about it and he thought I was the right guy for the job. At first I wasn't
really sure about how it was going to go over and then all the guys started
calling me at different times and voiced their support and telling me that
they were behind me 100%. That helped out a lot, I mean being a Captain
with Ted Dowling and Steve Fannell, it can be a little intimidating. All
the guys on our team are super guys and they made me feel welcome right
away. It's exciting, I just went out on the floor and didn't try to think
about it too much. I just went out there and tried to give 100%.
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Tell us about your personal goals on the onset of this 2001 season.
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Playoffs for sure. We need the playoffs. We should've had the playoffs
last season. And we just missed it by one. That New York game hurt us,
that Philly game hurt us. We can make some noise in this league. And when
we get to the playoffs, anything can happen. It's a super team, so playoffs
would be my goal.
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Your off season performances and being a member of the Brooklyn Redmen;
you, Gary, Scott, Brian, and Rob brought home the Mann Cup this year. Can
you touch on the similarities between this league and the NLL?
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Well, you're playing against a lot of the same players. This league is
obviously more intense. This is a super league. Last season we player more
playoff games for the Mann Cup then we did all season here in the winter.
It took us three series and to get that far, with the guys on our team, I
think we learned a lot. A lot of us hadn't won a major title like that. We
had one series go seven games and a bunch in overtime. We learned a lot and
hopefully we can carry that winning attitude over to these guys. We got a
taste of it tonight and we can't let it go.
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How about the Attack's direction for 2001 season with any reflections on
last season.
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Well, I think we have a good core of the guys back. And we have some
key additions. Obviously not having Darris is going to hurt us a little
bit. Santos and Teat should definitely pick up the right side. With this
team I don't think there's any reason why we cant be in the playoffs.
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As far as sports leagues go, you hear a lot about players and their
superstitions. You seem to have a few such as touching the goalie last
after the huddle and being the last one out of the locker room. Tell us a
little about your superstitions.
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It's just something I've always done. There's so many little small
things that I do. Everybody has their own little things I guess. I'll
touch Scotty in a certain way and I'll touch Gibby in a certain way. I
guess its like when you get in a groove or something like that. It's weird
the winter and summer is totally different and when I came back here I
picked it up just like that. It's superstitions for sure and that's hard to
explain.
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Is there any part of last season on a personal level that you want to
improve.
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Definitely more goals. I had one tonight but I had about 5 or 6 good
opportunities. It would be my goal scoring I guess. I'd also want to be
more confident with my defensive abilities and contribute more to the
defensive end.
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In tonight's game you played Ottawa, which is the old Syracuse Smash
team from last season. Albany's roster and Ottawa are predominantly
Canadian. What differences do you see in a game between rosters like these
and those that contain more American players such as Philadelphia and New
York?
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Well, there's the obvious difference between the American style and the
Canadian style of the game. Having an almost full Canadian team, we're all
pretty used to the style of game that Terry wants us to play. Terry and Bob
have a super system for running our bench. I don't think there's a big
precedent on American or Canadian guys. You just want to put the best team
out there. The style that he wants us to play we're all very used to.
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Any teams besides Philadelphia perhaps that you're looking to have a
rematch with this season?
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Philly for sure. Toronto for sure I think for a lot of the guys. We
beat Toronto by one goal here. They wiped us pretty good in Toronto though.
I say Toronto is the game that we're looking forward to.
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Tonight's crowd seemed a little smaller than expected by the team. How
does that affect you on the field?
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It would've been nicer to see a bigger turnout but they were loud and
the reaction that we got from talking to the fans after the game was that
they really enjoyed it. A bigger crowd next time would be nice.
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How about the future of Albany in the NLL?
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I think the future is really bright. We have a team that is really
young. We're improving after every game. It's going to be hard for the
fans not to come out. We're going to be a big franchise and that's going to
draw people in.
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