FAIRBANKS, ALASKA
Team NWT has 354 athletes within its ranks and amongst those are a few from the Deh Cho.

Fort Providence's Christina Bonnetrouge serves it up during badminton action at the Arctic Winter Games on Tuesday. - James McCarthy/NNSL photo

Badminton is where a couple are in action, those being Spencer and Christina Bonnetrouge, both of Fort Providence. Christina, who's playing in the juvenile girls division, has had ups and downs since beginning play on Monday. She's won some and lost some in singles, and is teaming up with Yellowknife's Aodhan Mooney in the girls doubles, where they had won two and lost one as of press time.

She said the event has been so far, so good and the level of play has been up and down.

"It all depends on who you play," she said. "If they're really good at badminton, then you end up playing a challenging team and some aren't as challenging. A lot of it is in your head and you have to stay positive and have a good strategy throughout the whole game."

When it comes to challenging teams, Greenland is perhaps the heavy favourite for gold in every division.

Bonnetrouge said the Greenlanders are probably the toughest challenge of all.

"They play badminton a whole lot and they practice a whole lot," she said.

This is the first Arctic Winter Games for Bonnetrouge and that fact isn't lost on her.

She said it's a great opportunity to be able to compete.

"It's been a great experience so far," she said. "I would go to Greenland in two years to play again."

But perhaps the biggest moment for the Deh Cho so far was the performance of Fort Liard's Alinda Edda, who won a silver ulu in the junior girls snowboard slalom. Edda finished two and a half seconds behind the gold uluit from from Alaska.

Three sports got underway on Sunday morning, those being curling, indoor soccer and volleyball but the big show, the opening ceremony, got things going officially on Sunday night. All eight teams marched in, wearing full uniform, in front of a raucous and loud crowd of more than 5,000 people, one of the larger attendances in recent memory. Veronica McDonald of Fort Smith had the honour of being the territory’s flag bearer.

Doug Rentmeister is the chef de mission for Team NWT and he said it was one of the better shows he’s ever seen.

"I would go so far as to say it was better than some of the Canada Games I’ve been to," he said. "There was no second-guessing whatsoever when it came to where we were supposed to go or where the athletes had to be. It was all real easy to follow."