Though medals eluded them, three Athabasca soccer teams held their own at the Alberta Soccer Association Outdoor Youth Tier IV City Provincials July 26–28 at the Lillian Osborne High School soccer fields in Edmonton.
The Athabasca U14 Blitz placed sixth, and the Athabasca U12 Titans FC placed fifth. The Athabasca U14 Big Maxx placed fourth, just shy of a bronze medal with two wins and two losses.
“I’m extremely happy with the results. These are the best teams in the province, and we were right in there,” said Alex Denonville, coach of the Big Maxx boys along with Adrian Krawec.
Denonville said he was especially proud of Friday’s 3-2 victory over Edmonton’s Meadows team.
“They dominated their league,” said Denonville of Meadows. “They won pretty much every game by four or five goals at least. To win against a team like that — very highly skilled — it just felt great.
“That was probably our most impressive victory of the year.”
It was Denonville’s second year coaching and his first year as a head coach, and he said hard work was what he tried to instill in his players.
“We’re a very fast team, so we use our speed, we use our endurance. We outworked a lot of teams this year.”
The Big Maxx boys lost their two Saturday games by one and two goals but won on Sunday in a 2-1 game against Calgary’s Signal Hill Fury.
The Athabasca Titans FC boys, coached by Glenn Martin and Randy Heck, played the regular season with smaller-than-regulation, 18-foot-wide nets. At provincials, they were faced with 24-foot nets.
“It was pretty daunting and a little scary for our goalie (Kaleb Langevin),” said Martin.
Martin said that difference in net size had a direct correlation to the team’s 12-0 loss to Edmonton’s Kilkenny team at their first game on Friday. The Edmonton team had played with regulation nets all year.
However, the Titans went on to tie and beat two teams from Calgary on Saturday and Sunday, finishing fifth out of six teams.
“I guess we started to get used to the big nets,” Martin said, adding that Langevin rose quickly to the challenge.
The Athabasca Blitz girls, coached by John Heroux and Susan Crites, lost all three of their games but won a game by default, finishing sixth out of seven teams.
Their first loss was 5-0 to Edmonton’s Carlisle team on Friday; the next day, they played a closer game against South West United (SWU) Union from Calgary, losing 2-0.
“We out-chanced them 15 to five. We just couldn’t score,” said Heroux of the SWU Union game.
The Sunday game against Calgary’s Deerfoot Eagles was the closest yet, and the Blitz lost 2-1 on a penalty kick. The Blitz were missing their usual centre and playing short up front; however, Hailey Dunsire filled the position and scored a goal off a breakaway.
“Those girls from the city — Calgary and Edmonton — breathe soccer. Our girls play soccer for two months out of the year, and we kept right up to them, so we’re pretty proud,” said Heroux.
It was the first year Athabasca teams participated in city provincials; normally they participate in rural provincials. Martin said the calibre of teams was about the same as the rural teams Athabasca is accustomed to facing.
“I just thought it was great we had a whole extra month to practise,” said Martin of the later dates for the city tournament.
