For the first time since its inception the hosts of the Girls Rock lacrosse tournament walked away on the top of the podium.
The Okotoks Mustangs Bantam girls won the gold medal at the third annual Girls Rock Okotoks Mustangs Lacrosse Association tournament with a 9-6 win over the Sherwood Park Titans, May 20 at the Subway Soccer Centre in Calgary.
“It was a big division this year with 12 teams so it’s quite an accomplishment coming to the end on top,” said Mustangs coach Clint Bymak.
Okotoks cruised through the round-robin section with convincing wins over the Rockyview Rage, St. Albert Rams and Edmonton Warriors. The Titans and Mustangs finished with identical 3-0 records after pool play, but the Sherwood Park team held the tiebreaker with 14.5 points to Okotoks’ 14. The top two spots qualified the clubs for the tournament final on May 20.
“They’re a solid program,” Bymak said of the Titans. “They medaled in a lot of these (divisions) so it’s definitely an accomplishment beating that team.”
The first two periods saw three of the Mustangs’ first four goals answered almost immediately by a resilient Sherwood Park squad leading to a 4-4 score going into the third period.
Bymak said the Mustangs made a successful adjustment to pressure the Sherwood Park shooters in the final period to thwart the Titans’ attack.
“Our girls don’t let them in close because of our defence, but they don’t understand to pressure them further because the Sherwood Park team has good shooters,” Bymak said. “I always like to pressure and force them to make a quick pass rather than stop and shoot the ball.”
On a roster featuring players with varying degrees of experience, it was a trio of veteran Mustangs who combined for all nine goals as Malia Schneider potted four goals, Ally Bymak notched a hat trick and Julia Porter scored a pair.
“We’ve got a lot of young girls, new girls on the team so it’s always nerve-wracking knowing where to put them because you can’t send them out there all together because there’s just a breakdown,” Bymak said. “It’s a matter of managing the bench.”
Okotoks’ Ally Bymak broke the 4-4 deadlock on a great second effort at the end of a long shift to start the final period.
“I knew we needed to score and get up because we knew the other team would get down when we got up,” said Ally, a student at Heritage Heights School. “All we were doing was trying to go through the middle as much as possible.”
Ally would add another goal to go along with a third period hat-trick from Schneider to put the game out of reach. Ally said the Mustangs’ commitment to defence led to fast break offence in transition for Okotoks.
“We would keep someone back and then they would run up and cut through the middle and that’s how we got most of our goals,” Ally said. “Then towards the end when we had the lead we just wanted to keep it so we would keep someone back just for safety because that team would shoot outside of the house.”
Schneider, who created ample opportunities with great speed in transition and tenacity in the offensive zone, said she felt a bit snake-bitten after 40 minutes.
“In the second period I did get frustrated, but I knew some of them had to go in so I kept shooting and shooting,” said Schneider, a Millarville resident. “I tried shooting low at the beginning and that didn’t work and then I tried shooting high and then I noticed she was weaker on bottom corners and I started shooting there.”
Porter used her seven years of lacrosse experience to find openings in the offensive zone for her two goals. The High River native said Okotoks worked well as a collective unit in the final.
“It was teamwork,” she said of the key to victory. “You can’t win a team sport with one person so it was (about) passing, setting picks.”
First-year goalie Nataliah Herr fought some early nerves to put in a solid performance in limiting the vaunted Titans to just three goals in the final two frames.
“In the second period I started not being nervous and getting into the game,” said Herr, who was pleasantly surprised to come away with the gold medal. “I thought they were going to beat us, but they didn’t and it was a really good feeling.”
The Bantam girls were far from the only Mustangs representative at the 33-team tournament. For the first time in its three-year existence, Okotoks featured a team in all four age groups: Novice, Peewee, Bantam and Midget. For more information on Okotoks Mustangs Lacrosse go to www.okotokslacrosse.com.
