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By: Jessyka Maliksi  

WELLAND – This past weekend the u10 Warner girls travelled to Welland, ON. to compete in the Division 1 Ontario Cup.  

The girls played four games over the weekend at Niagara College. 

The first game was on Friday night against the Tecumseh Saints.  

After a long day of travelling the girls won 23-17.  

On Saturday afternoon, the girls played their second game of the tournament.  

Being able to sleep in, the girls took that advantage and came out ready to play against Transway #2.  

After a close battle the girls came out on top, winning 33-27.  

They finished their Saturday night with another win. Defeating the Barrie Royals 23-14.  

After going 3-0, the girls were headed to the gold medal game Sunday afternoon against the East York Eagles.  

After battling the entire game, the girls came short by two points, losing 15-17.  

u10 Warner girls with their silver medal at Niagara College in Welland, ON.

Throughout the season no one could have predicted this team’s success, barely being able to find a full roster and coach.  

But the girls stepped up and stayed together the whole season, finishing second in Division 1 and 10th in u10 Ontario Basketball.  

The girls couldn’t have done it without parent volunteer, Alex Warner, stepping up to coach the girls when no one else wanted to.  

Congratulations girls! What a season!  

Until next season… 

u10 Warner Roster

The U14 Callahan crew went East for their first games of the season. They won their first game 44-37 over ONL. The girls kept a steady pace against a strong Brockville team in their second game, but ultimately fell short 30-25

The u10 team played with heart in Brockville this weekend.

Our retuning girls set the tempo early and showed great leadership. Our new players played outstanding D. Well done girls! – Coach

The u12 girls won in a controlled scrimmage against County Clippers tonight at Eastside Secondary. Coach Holoway says the girls did really well in their first game of the season.

Interested in coaching next season? The 2023-2024 coaching application is now open.

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The u14 major bantam team consisted of seven grade 7’s and four grade 8’s.

They played in the OBL under division 5 competing against AA teams.

It was a season full of growth and development which eventually turned into meeting individual player milestones and team successes.

The overall record of the team was 25 wins and 5 losses.

Season highlights included winning gold in their division at the Mike O’Connor tournament, placing first in their pool in OBL with a 10 and 2 record, and going 4 and 0 at the Ontario Cup in Niagara Falls to win gold in their division. (Another highlight was beating rival Kingston Impact!).

Coach McGrath would like to thank his assistant coaches, Darrell Edgett and Justin Shakel for their help throughout the season.

Special thanks to Sara Rozema as the team manager and keeping everything organized and running smoothly.

Thank you to the Spirits executive for their hard work and dedication to keeping youth sports and specifically club basketball an important part of the Belleville community.

Scarlet
Madilyn
Alexa
Logan
Sofia
Hadley
Whitney
Paige
Rylee
Tess
Julia

First and foremost Coach Palleschi would like to thank coach Darryl Drain for helping coach the U12 girls this past year..  He did a great job developing the U12 girls last year, and in particular the 6 returning girls that started with him as Grade 5s.  The girls were very lucky to have him as a coach again this year.

The team would also like to thank Ashley Empey, Stacy Lyall and Melissa Copen-Gabourie for helping with hotels, logistics and running Teamsnap and Gary Lyall for helping coach on the bench during the Ontario Cup.  Thanks to all the parents for their support throughout the year.   Finally a big thanks to Erin as president and the rest of the executive, presiding over a very successful and virtually trouble free year including, with a special callout to  Sara Rozema for her outstanding communications throughout the year which I’m sure will help our recruiting efforts next year.

This year’s U12 Spirits team was composed of 10 Grade 6s (including 6 returning players) , 1 Grade 5 player and 1 Grade 4 player.

Unexpectedly, the team was placed in Division 1 of the OBL, just below OBLX to start the season.  With only a few practices under their belt, the parents were cautioned that this could get ugly and to be patient.  We prepared to do our best with an eye to re-ranking ½ way through which would likely drop us to a more appropriate level of competition.

The kids, however, had another thing in mind.   The team won their 1st Division 1 OBL game (by 1 point) and the girls not only started in Division 1, they proved they belonged.   The team went 2-4 (competitive in all 6 games)  and remained in Division 1 after the re-ranking which saw 2 of the teams we played competitively move up to OBLX to replace 2 other OBLX teams that moved down to Division 1.  Things were not going to get any easier.  Outside of Division 1 teams, the U12 girls had little trouble with teams below Division 1.

The girls continued to play competitively, often down 1 or 2 players, that finally led to a 13th place final ranking in the Province which placed them 5th in the Division 1 pool of the Ontario Cup.

The Ontario Cup was the highlight of the season as the girls went 2 and 1 and tied  for 1st overall in pool play; being that close to unbelievably  qualifying for Division 1 Gold..  The team, however,  lost the tie-breaker to the #1 ranked team and eventual Gold Medal winner putting them in the Bronze Medal game.

In the bronze medal game, the girls  started slowly and were down 25-5 after the 5th shift to the 2nd ranked team in Division 1.  After a spirited time-out, they dominated the rest of the game only to come up short  37-29.  Still a great effort by all the girls and a final ranking of 12th, moving up 1 spot after the Ontario Cup. 

The coaches are very proud of what this group of girls accomplished this year, exceeding all of their  expectations.  With fair play in U12 you need all 12 kids to contribute in order to play at a Division 1 level and these girls did just that.  More importantly,  all of the girls improved from the start of the season.  The future of the Spirits looks very bright and we look forward to seeing how these girls continue to develop as they continue their competitive careers for the Spirits.

It was a privilege coaching these fine young ladies!

Liberty
Shelby
Audrina
Kyrah
Myla
Nora
Zoe
Avery
Raya
Mila
Callie
Abigail  

When the U10 Girls started this season, the plan was to get together once a week at Harry J Clarke and work on developing their skills and learning the rules of basketball. They were not even going to register as a competitive team; they would just have some friendly scrimmages with the County Clippers, with parents as refs.

On October 29th the girls had their first ever scrimmages with the Peterborough Power and the County Clippers. They lost the first game to Peterborough, and came out with a victory against the Clippers. After that weekend the girls and their parents caught the basketball fever and decided they wanted to have a chance to play more teams, with actual refs. They registered as a competitive team with OBA shortly after.

The girls went on to play the Clippers multiple times, splitting the season series 4-4, and had a couple more games against the Power that were always close losses, and they lost by a very large margin to the Scarborough Blues.

With only ever beating the Clippers, there were modest expectations of how the girls would do during the 8 team East Meets West tournament they hosted for the end of their season. They did however have more experience than before and added a strong player in Mila Kaliaiev who had finished her season with the U12 girls.

In their first game they lost by 1 point against the Peterborough Power. After shaking off the rust of their first game, they came out firing, scoring their highest season point total of 34 points, while only giving up 7 to the Kanata Cavaliers. To make it to the playoff round they had to now beat the Scarborough Blues who had crushed them earlier in the year, but the girls were up for the challenge! They came out firing again, putting themselves up 8-2 in the first shift. From there it was a battle all game, but they ended up holding the Blues off and winning by 5 to clinch 1st place in their pool!

In the semi-finals against a tough Nepean Blue Devils team, the ball was not dropping like the day before, but the girls team defense continued to be the catalyst for their success, as they won the lowest scoring game of the tournament, 13 – 9. In the finals, they were up against that same Scarborough Blues team once again. It was a back and forth battle, and going into the final shift the game was 13-12 for the Spirits. The last shift went on and scored 6 points while giving up none, and the girls finished their tournament and their season as champions!

These girls showed up to every practice eager and ready to learn from the very beginning. Most of them could not even get the ball in on an eight foot net when the year started, but they persevered and got better because of it. This same growth was evident as well from their first game to their last!

– Coach Michell