The South Delta Sun Devils girls field hockey team finished its season with an impressive ninth-place finish last week against tough competition at the provincials in Chilliwack.
SDSS was grouped with Okanagan Mission and Winston Churchill in round robin play – a tough grouping according to head coach Neil McLennan.
Both games were tight contests with the Sun Devils battling to a 2-2 tie with Churchill and a 2-1 loss to Okanagan Mission.
Only the top two teams from each group advanced to the championship playoffs, meaning the Sun Devils would drop into the consolation playoff bracket as they only had one point from round robin play.
They impressed on the consolation side with a 5-0 win over Sardis, a 2-0 win over Eric Hamber and a 3-0 win over Maple Ridge.
Early in the season, SDSS played invitational tournaments – the Friendship Cup in September, Bridgman Cup in Victoria on the Thanksgiving long weekend and finally the Golden Pumpkin the third weekend in October at Tamanawis Park in Surrey.
“We used the tournaments as an opportunity to learn to play together, play against some of the best AA and AAA schools and build ourselves as a team,” said McLennan. “The results from these events were quite good…some wins, loses and ties, which was fine as predominately we were just looking for good competition.”
Between these tournaments, SDSS had league games against Surrey schools winning all their games to claim the top seed at the Fraser Valley championships, where SDSS beat Panorama Ridge on Oct. 26 to claim the Fraser Valley title.
“All in all it was a good season,” he said. “We proved that we were a good team and while we maybe cannot take on the major powerhouses of the province, we can play the game very well. We improved during the year and got better and better as the season progressed which was fun to watch.”
Here is the full roster for this year’s team: Grade 12: Anna Sonnenberg, Ashley Fincham, Taite Cantlon, Maddy Plante, Olivia de Albuquerque, Nina Dannhauser, Brooklyn Kuchma, and Teagan Reid; Grade 11: Ineke ter Keurs, Maddy Turner, Kylie Kamiya and Lili Wyber; Grade 10: Kassandra Sharpe; and Grade 9: Sydney Taylor-Hunt.
