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Titans Stingrays
Above Top Row (left
to right): Coach Cyndi Flett, Rebekka, Lia, Maria, Nathalie, Emma, Audrey,
Christine, Danielle, Coach Kasia Hart,
Michelle
Bottom Row (left to
right): Meredith, Catherine, Patti,
Tina
Stingrays in the park
Submitted by Sue Jones
Game one the girls had a hard game against York Mavericks. They chipped away scoring 6 goals against their tough competitor. The final score of the game was 10-6 in the Mavericks favour, but this score did not depict the hard work and cohesive play of this team. They were able to put into play all they have learned this season with goals scored by Taylor, Ceilidh, and Chantal and great team play and set ups by the rest of the girls. No goals can be scored without the playmakers!! Honourable mention to Katie for her three shots on net even though she only had full sight from one eye thanks to a hard elbow in the second period. Her eye was swollen and started to bruise almost right away. "Are you okay Katie?" "Yeah, it doesn't really hurt, I just can't see very well." :)
Game two the girls played at 8:15am against Kitchener Waterloo. This was a tough game for the girls as they had some trouble waking up before the game, even with a quick run around the outside of the building before going in. The first half saw only one shot on net and some long faces. We changed benches at half and the girls seemed to leave the tiredness behind. They were outscored 4-0 in the first half and came back to finish with an even second half and an end result of 6-2. Both goals scored by Rachel's powerful shot assisted by Taylor and Katie. The girls fought hard and defended well in the second half!
Game three we played our "Arch Rival" the Flying Fish. This was by far the best game of the weekend. All of the girls played well and fought hard for this game. We finished the regular play tied at 4 and went into over 9 minutes of overtime. The intensity of this game was tough on everyone including coaches, managers and parents. The ball was up and down the pool, shot after shot on both ends until finally the tie breaker was scored by Natalie of the Flying Fish. It was a great goal, but a heart breaker for the Marlins. Goals in this game were scored by Ceilidh, Katie and an amazing nearly half pool shot from Emma! This game inspired my favourite moment of the weekend. The girls had worked so hard that the loss had some of them in tears from sheer exhaustion and disappointment. The words from their coach had us all in tears before we left the pool. Alison took the girls aside for their meeting and could barely get the words out herself. "I am so proud of each and every one of you." She went on to say the scoreboard showed defeat but the girls have shown nothing but victory.
Sunday morning and another VERY early start for game four, the girls played Hamilton for 5th place. The game started slowly with them down 4-1 at half. Again the girls changed benches and left any tiredness or worry behind. The went on to win the game 6-4!! Goals scored by Katie (including one after her sprained finger and a great 5 metre), Ceilidh and Rachel. The girls worked hard and were happy to end on a winning note! The girls were tied for 5th with York at the end of their game, but because they had beaten us earlier in the weekend they took over the 5th place spot and we finished 6th. Great job girls!!
A weekend honourable mention goes out to our AllStar Goalie Jessica Gaudreault!! Save after save kept us in the game more than once. She faced more than 20 shots a game, with the exception of Sunday morning and even faced 33 against the Flying Fish, one third of those in overtime. We had 7 kick outs that game and they didn't get the ball past Jessica on any of those opportunities! She was calm and cool and even through her Friday evening coughing fits was able to keep this team in the game and at times get them back in. The girls were very proud of her and you could hear the oohs and ahhhs from the crowd watching! A total of 103 shots on net, she got a hand on and saved 53 of these and only 25 got by her (10 scored by a very tough York team)!! Jessica, you should be very proud of yourself!!
We spent the rest of the day cheering on the Flying Fish and the Stingrays to their 4th and 1st place finishes!! The weekend was great. Our accommodations allowed us to prepare meals in our room, which because of the schedule we did both evenings. It was fun and the kids seemed to really enjoy it. They once again, and as always, represented the club well and as their parents likely hoped they would! Great job girls. You made your Coach and Manager proud in all respects!!
Titans
Marlins with Coach
Alison Poirier
(top)
Left to Right:
Chantal, Jessica, Chanelle, Laura, Ceilidh, Taylor, Emma,
Rachel
Titans Marlins
Top Row (left to
right): Taylor, Ceilidh, Natasha, Katie,
Emma
Bottom Row (left to
right): Chanelle, Coach Alison Poirier, Manager Sue Jones
Flying
Fish
Submitted
by Greg Sidebottom
It was an exciting weekend for the Flying Fish and the 16U Cadet Girls
Ontario Provincial Championships last weekend. The tournament was
organized into two pools for round robin play, with the top two teams
playing cross over semi-final playoff games, winners going to the gold
medal game and losers going to the bronze. The Flying Fish were in
a pool with the Marlins, KW, and York. The other pool was the
Stingrays, Scarborough, and Hamilton. The Flying Fish and Marlins
had played the KW, Scarborough, York and Hamilton teams in January at
the York Invitational tournament, where KW beat Scarborough 9-2 to take
the gold. In York tournament, the Titans teams played well but
couldn't match these other teams. But with 3 months of team
training in the meantime and longer benches for this big event, we liked
our chances of surprising these teams by playing at their level this
time.
The Flying Fish started off slow in their first game against the
powerful KW team, losing 8-2. But nobody was down about this as it
was a big improvement on the 12-2 loss the Fish suffered to KW at the
York tournament and KW, full of big strong players, was a favorite to
play in the gold medal game.
The next game for the Flying Fish was a barn burner against York.
The Fish jumped out to a 3-1 lead in the first quarter, with
Melanie doing a great job of containing Emily Torrens of York (who I
heard scored 8 of the 9 goals York goals against the Marlins). But
York fought back to tie the game 3-3 at the half. The Fish added a
goal in the third quarter and that lead held until 28 seconds left in
the fourth when York tied it up 4-4. So with two goals each from
Natalie and Tara we were headed to overtime. And a few minutes
into overtime Demi scored from the hole while her head looked to be
under water from the York pressure!
The last game of the round robin pitted the Flying Fish against their
friends the Marlins. A win for the Flying Fish meant second in the
pool and a shot at medals. A win for the Marlins meant a 3-way tie
for second in the pool which would likely have left York in second place
with the best +/-, goals for the three. So there was lots on the
line for the Flying Fish, and the Marlins made it anything but easy for
them.
There was no scoring in the first quarter, a 2-2 tie at the end of the
second quarter, and a 4-4 tie at the end of the third quarter, with Tara
and Demi doing the scoring for the Fish. There were lots of
chances but no scoring in the fourth quarter, setting the Fish parents
up to watch their second heart thumping overtime of the day. Both
teams battled as hard as they could for an astounding nine and a half
minutes of overtime with no subs and shots galore but no goals until
Natalie finally sunk one in at 9:36.
This big win set the Flying Fish up for the ultimate challenge of a game
with the Stingrays that evening. After a little pregame fun at
center with the Stingrays during the warm-up, it was down to business.
The Fish came out Flying in the first quarter and the Stingrays
just maybe were taking it a bit easy as the Fish had more scoring
chances in the early going until the Stingrays put one in with 2:33
remaining in the first quarter. It was all Stingrays for the rest
of the first half for a 6-0 lead at half time. Tina popped up in
goal for the Stingrays in the second half and we were hoping to see
Nathalie (the Stingray's regular goalie) play out as well, but that
didn't happen. Monique got the Flying Fish on the board late in
the third quarter and Lulu added another in the fourth quarter for 12-2
Stingrays win with ten different Stingrays scoring. There were
lots of hugs thrown in with the post game handshakes.
Titans Flying Fish
Top Row (left to
right): Sophie, Lulu, Sarah, Melanie, Demi, Natalie, Johanna, Coach Jen
Hampton
Bottom Row (left to
right): Tara, Jelena, Katrina, Monique
Titans Girls hang
together!
Great White Sharks are 2008 18U Men Ontario Champions
Submitted by Carolyn McGill
The Titans Great White Sharks retained the provincial 18U (formerly Youth) Men's Championship for another year, going undefeated at the Etobicoke Olympium last weekend.
The team traveled to Toronto with the Manta Rays, then played two games (vs. Hamilton and York B) on Friday. That earned them all of Saturday off, except for a light workout and a team meeting.
The Great White Sharks returned to the pool early Sunday morning to meet old rivals Scarborough. Goalie Ben did an outstanding job for the entire tournament, but especially in this game, while the forward players were still getting warmed up. In fact, the 5-1 game was really a shut-out for Ben, as the sole Scarborough goal was achieved while Ben was on a kick-out.
Although we came home with the gold, Sunday was also memorable for the boys visiting the complimentary hotel breakfast buffet twice: by coach's orders a light meal before their morning game, and everything their hearts and stomachs desired after their win. (Note that this was done with the hotel's blessing!)
The gold medal game was Great White Sharks vs. home team York A. York were worthy opponents, but nearing the end of the third period, the Titans were ahead 10-7, and starting to look more and more in control. Then two opposing athletes got into some one-on-one action and things escalated on both sides before the referees started to pay attention. Unfortunately their ruling was a four-minute, period-straddling penalty against the Titans.
With only five forwards, that big Olympium pool was looking even bigger, but the Titans kept their cool and held their ground. They even scored once to York's twice, for a net loss of only one goal during the very long "man down" situation. Final score 12-10.
The team played some very good, fast, team water polo at this tournament. They made their power plays count, and showcased some strategic lob shots.
Congratulations to all the Great White Sharks; and to Calum and Charles, who were named to the tournament All-Star team. Calum was also tournament MVP.
Thanks to our hard-working coaches Jerry Tesanovic and Nick Forster for guiding the boys to this win. Thanks also to the Manta Rays/Great White Sharks manager/chaperone team: Lorraine Proulx, Heather Seaman, Judy and Dave Thomas, Yew Lee and Carolyn McGill.
Titans Great White Sharks (left to right): Coach Nick Forster, James, Ben, Alec, John, Lyle, Charles, Calum Norton, Logan (kneeling), Ogi, Connor, Coach Jerry Tesanovic
Titans
Manta Rays
