The Panhellenic Tournament is very quickly becoming to
the Sudbury summer soccer schedule what the Big Nickel
Tournament is to the local winter scene. The soccer tournament
is easily the largest draw for out of town youth soccer squads
to our lovely little neck of the woods and continues to build a
base of solid repeat business.
Some may bemoan the fact that there is still plenty of success
being garnered from the out of town contingents who took to the
pitch for the annual celebration of both soccer skill and Greek
heritage. But I believe it's a wonderful thing.
For the Panhellenic tournament to grow and prosper, it must
attract some of the better teams in the province, even if that
comes at the price of loading up the local trophy case. And it
wasn't as though the Sudbury contingent was shut out of the
medal hunt, as we'll see over the next few paragraphs, taking a
look back at the 10th annual edition of the summer-time
tradition.
In fact, it was an all Nickel City final for the U-13 Girls
crown as the Panhellenic Thunder blanked S.C. Italia Diavoli
2-0 in the championship affair, with Laura Ozoria and Carlee
Parisotto handling the scoring for the victors. The teams had
opened divisional play on Friday evening, registering a
scoreless draw in a grouping that also drew teams from
Collingwood, Barrie and Rayside-Balfour.
The Panhellenic Storm U-14 Girls displayed a stifling overall
team defense, recording five consecutive shutouts that was
culminated by a 4-0 whitewash of the North Bay Stingers for the
second local title of Sunday afternoon. Kara Lloyd netted a
pair of goals to lead the Storm offensively, with Michelle
Graham and Courtney Ceccarelli adding singles.
The Panhellenic Lightning made it a clean sweep of three of the
older divisions of girls action, nabbing the U15-16 banner with
a 2-1 win over the Bradford Eagles. Michelle Jacques and
Brigitte Lamothe found the back of the net for the Panhellenic
crew, who also recorded very competitive 2-0 victories over
both the Woodstock Pacers and North Bay Fitzgerald Roofing en
route to the finals.
A slightly easier pathway to a tournament title for the
Panhellenic United crew, who picked up four straight wins
facing the North Bay Wolverines, Orillia Lightning and
Panhellenic Storm. Joey Martellacci registered the hat trick in
the final as United bounced the Wolverines 5-1. Single markers
came courtesy of Chad Ringstead and Owen Montpellier.
Interestingly enough, the bulk of the most hotly contested
divisional battles seemed to spring up from the younger age
brackets, including the U-13 Boys, that featured a total of 12
teams, including representatives from Oshawa, Newmarket, Whitby
and Burlington.
When the dust settled, the Panhellenic Spitfire had more than
held their own, blanking Oshawa Turul 1-0 in the semi-final
game before falling to the Erin Mills Eagles in the Gold medal
encounter.
While Sudbury was not represented in the very last game to be
completed early Sunday evening, the West Storm Rouge and Barrie
Spirit gave the assembled crowd a wonderful sendoff with a
12-player shootout needed to decide matters.
And there is no denying that Sault Ste Marie representatives
made a strong case for the "one club system," a soccer
organizational framework that is present in most other parts of
the province outside of Sudbury. The Sooites gathered
representative and houseleague youth soccer forces under one
banner some two decades ago. While talks are continuing locally
to bring a similar system in place in Sudbury, it is certainly
a long way from a done deal.
In the meantime, the Sault Civics contingent left Sudbury with
three championship banners in hand, with another pair of teams
finishing as Silver medalists in their respective
classifications. Winning teams from our Northern rival included
the Sault Civics U-11 girls "A" team, Lucidia Sault Civics U-12
girls and the Prouse Firebird Sault Civics U-16 boys.
The Burlington Thunder downed the Thunder Bay Chill 3-0 to
return south with the U-11 boys crown. The Brampton East Flames
were easily the top of the class in the U-12 boys grouping,
while the Barrie Spirit, who provided great support to the
Panhellenic event (they sent seven teams), capped off the list
of championship teams by capturing the U-15 boys crown.
It may not yet have the draw that the Big Nickel clan can
attract, but give the Panhellenic Tournament time. At just 10
years of age, the event is still young, but definitely heading
in the right direction.
Randy Pascal is the voice of Persona 10 Sports and the founder of SudburySports.com.