Featured photo: Muskoka U13 FC team members and coaches (front) Dakota Fraser; (kneeling from left) Jasmine O’Dell, Haley Birkhimer, Jess Napper, Ashley Smith, Katie Beane, Emma Dickson, Grace Wood, Erika Carr; (standing from left) Scott Wood, Sandra O’Dell, Andrea Hill, Meagan Beane, Marisa Tomassoni, Sophia Marshall, Carys Crichton, Jordyn Tannahill, Paighton Rochette, Kate Franks, Dino Tomassoni, and Michael Hill
Photos supplied.
Huntsville’s competitive soccer teams, the Strikers, have left their mark this year and that will no doubt be noted this week when the Huntsville Soccer Club holds its annual meeting.
The U14 Boys team went undefeated playing Competitive Recreational teams. The combined Muskoka U13 Girls team finished second in the Huronia District Soccer League and will advance next season to the Central Girls Soccer League.
The U18 Boys team only lost one game playing in the competitive level of the Huronia District Soccer League. The team came back with 11 wins and three ties to win the league championship after losing the first game of the season to Aurora 3-1. They also finished runner-up to Pickering for the League Cup.
U18 Boys team: (front from left) Brody Murphy, Jack Armstrong; (middle row from left) Nathan Valliere, James Eydt, Zach Farnsworth, Matthew Allen, Nick Lavigne, Dylan Welsh, Arrick Lupton; (back from left) Asst. Coach Gerry Forestell, Evan Mashinter, Quinn Thompson, Tommy Giblin, Eric MacNeil, Adam Lavigne, Coach Daniel Sanderson. Absent: Jordan Marshall, Bret Zylstra
U18 coach Craig Thompson also coached several of the players when they were just 12-years-old, and at that time they were being beaten by the larger centres by double-digit scores. He also coached the U16 group last year.
“We had some early meetings to talk about commitment,” he said, “and I know these kids very well. We were up against teams that play 12 months of the year, so they are very good with the ball. What we had was tremendous heart, and great athletes. Their fitness is awesome. Our focus this year was to play as a team. To win, we decided we had to be the best team not necessarily the best players. The kids did what they had to do every game as a team. They bought in to that concept.”
Thompson says playing in the competitive leagues only helps to build soccer in Huntsville.
The better teams you play, the better you get. If you just play house league all the time and play these teams only a couple of times in tournaments, it’s not the same as playing on a regular basis. You start to learn what you need to do, how you need to play against these good teams from the larger centres. U18 Coach Craig Thompson
Chuck Cooper coached the U14 Boys team that went undefeated in the recreational competitive league, winning 11 games. Huntsville won both the league and the Huronia District League Cup. See earlier story here.
“We had some really good players,” said Cooper. “Jack Lockwood was our top scorer. He scored a lot of goals early in the season but by the end of the year he was one our most consistently unselfish players, sharing the ball, passing the ball, never took a shift off, and worked very hard. We saw great leaps forward by some of the others who had been perhaps fringe players in the past. Centre back Oliver Byl became almost unbeatable as the season progressed. Austin McKee and Jason Thompson were other players who came into their own.”
Like Craig Thompson, Cooper says the Rep program is going in the right direction.
“There’s a progression there. You have to play against good competition to raise the bar not only as players but as coaches.”
One challenge for Rep teams in all divisions is getting enough committed players each year. That is a concern for next year’s U18 team.
This year the U13 Girls team had the same problem but combined with Bracebridge to form the Muskoka Football Club. They went on to take the second place title in the Huronia District Soccer League and will advance to the Central Girls Soccer League next year.
Other centres have a greater population base to choose from. They also have indoor or night-time facilities with lights. Those advantages stack against Huntsville. The U13 Girls are hoping to raise money so that the team can train in the Bradford Dome in the winter season.
Craig Thompson says that if Huntsville had lights at either Conroy Park or McCulley-Robertson it would be more convenient to run late teen and adult programs to accommodate schedules where players work during the day.
These are all growing challenges, but for now there’s celebration over this year’s accomplishments and plans are underway for an even greater success story in 2017.
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