By Mitch Bach

‘I’m coming for him at nationals’: Lacroix on falling to Zawadi at Canada Winter Games

Feb 21, 2019 | 3:11 PM

RED DEER, AB — Janick Lacroix of the Medicine Hat Boxing Club is settling for silver at the Canada Winter Games after narrowly losing by the judges vote to Mohamed Zawadi of Ontario.

Although he’s disappointed with the outcome, the 16-year-old is happy with how he faired against one of the best 75kg fighters in the world.

“I think I fought really well,” said Lacroix, who struck gold at the 2018 Super Channel National Championships. “(Mohamed) had really tight defence and he was tough to get to. I found some openings on him and took those. I thought that was enough to win the fight, but I guess the judges thought differently.”

Three of the five rounds were tilted towards Zawadi by the judges’ discretion, with two rounds awarded to the young Hatter. 

Lacroix admits he was surprised when the referee raised Zawadi’s arm as the victor rather than his own.

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“I thought I won that fight, honestly,” he continued. “The whole crowd thought that. It just didn’t go my way.”

Team Alberta head coach Kerry Fahlman, who’s also in charge of the Medicine Hat Boxing Club, was also caught off guard by the result.

“I thought that probably Janick fought the best fight of his life,” said Fahlman. “A good part of the crowd and people in the know in boxing thought that we were wronged on that one. We don’t want to go in there saying that, because I’m happy with his performance.

“Of course a gold would have been nice but silver is good too.”

Lacroix is putting the Games behind him and focusing on several more tournaments coming up. He’s confident in his ability to qualify for nationals by winning a third straight provincial title next month.

In fact, he’s already gunning towards a potential rematch with Zawadi in the Canadian Boxing Championship final in April.

“I’m definitely going to keep training hard, harder than I ever have,” added Lacroix. “And then I’m going to meet (Zawadi) again at nationals. We’ll see how that goes.

“I’m coming for him at nationals.”