Pacific Rim Championship

Japan will look for improvements from their 1995 Pacific Women's Championship showing.

Their fourth place finish was not all that surprising, considering three of the world's top four squads take part in this competition, but what was disappointing was being out-scored 46-1 over five games.

Toru Itabashi heads the team again this year and he is joined by Takayuki Hattanda and Shunji Tanaka. At the 1996 Asian Games in February, Japan placed second behind China and ahead of Kazakhstan. They lost to China 9-3, but defeated Kazakhstan 6-2.

Of the 20 players they took to the Asian Games - the first 20 listed below - only four player personnel changes were made from the 1995 Pacific Championship team.

Canadians Wally Kozak and Rick Polutnik have been assisting the Japanese national team development program. Kozak was with the squad at the Î96 Asian Games, while Polutnik will accompany the team for a second consecutive year at the Pacific Women's Championship.

Japan has appeared in only one Women's World Championship, finishing eighth in 1990.