April 3, 2002
bulletRenegades Hockey Tournament Has Always Been "For The Kids"
 

Renegades Hockey Tournament Has Always Been "For The Kids"

Jim McLoughlin, shown on the far right in the photo, can remember sitting at the kitchen table with Jean Cayen, Robin Gosselin and Moose Gosselin for a "coffee or something" about 20 years ago. They discussed many things, but one of the topics had to deal with helping kids in the area, in particular, with kids who wanted to play hockey. They realized that some kids just couldn’t afford the costs and decided to do something about the problem. From that conversation emerged the "Renegades Athletic Club", and anyone who has lived in Valley East and Capreol will recognize the name.

This year marked the 19th anniversary of the Renegades Hockey Tournament, and it was indeed all about "giving something back to the kids". Shown in the photo are Adam Waram on the front left, a left wing with the Sports North Flyers Bantams and Tareck Azzeh a center man with the Sports North Senators. In the background from the left are Gates Poitras, Hilda Kingsley and McLoughlin - representing the many volunteers who worked so hard to make this year’s event such a big success.

Both hockey players in the photo were named tournament MVP’s of their respective teams. Adam is holding an aluminum hockey stick and Tareck is wearing a pair of leather hockey gloves. The prizes, which were given to all MVP’s of team finalists, were donated by Andrew Brunette, a member of the N.H.L’s Minnesota Wild. Andrew also provided the tournament with numerous other prizes as well as cash as his way of "thanking the community for their support and to give a little something back to the kids".

Besides Andrew, other major corporate sponsors include Desjardins’ Food Basics and Club Optimiste de la Vallee Est. As a result of the corporate sponsors, all of the finalists also received beautiful medals and individual summer jackets.

Tournament results were as follows:

In the Tyke Division: The Capreol Hawks went undefeated in all five games, edging out Nickel Centre by the tune of 3 to 1 in the championship game. Valley East’s Shack A Patates won the consolation title by downing Kalmo Auto by the same 3 to 1 score.

The Novice Division saw the closest competition of all. Sudbury Teak Furniture needed overtime to edge out Valley East Brankor in the semi-finals, before coming out on top of a 1 to 0 score with Valley East ESO Dynamic to capture the gold medal.

In the Atom Division: Copper Cliff Anaheim went undefeated in five games, including three shutouts and allowing only four goals. They downed Valley East Interstate Batteries by a score of 4 to 3 in the championship game.

In the PeeWee Division: The Sudbury Midas PeeWees downed Onaping Falls Huskies by a score of 3 to 0 to take the gold medal in that division.

In the Bantam Division: Sports North Senators overpowered rival Sports North Flyers by a score of 6 to 0 to win the Bantam title.

In the Midget Division: The Valley East Lions saved the day for the host organization by upsetting the powerful St. Charles club by a score of 6 to 3 in a very entertaining, disciplined, well-played match with very few penalties.

"It’s a great feeling to look at how happy the kids have been this weekend," explained McLoughlin as he was watching some kids play hockey with mini-sticks in the upstairs hall and as he observed the two finalists in Bantam Division take their places at the table to have a drink of pop and wait to receive their awards. "All of the volunteers work so hard, the sponsors always come through for us each year, and the kids end the season enjoying a weekend of great competition. This is what it’s all about! It’s for the kids."

"We especially want to thank Andrew Brunette for the donations he made to us this year," added McLoughlin. You will not find any other tournament like this where kids receive prizes of this magnitude. He went out of his way to make sure that this was one of the best tournaments ever held in Valley East and we can’t wait to shake his hand when he comes home at the end of the season."

"I also have to say that the refereeing in this tournament has been fantastic. While I may give them a bit of a hard time when I am behind the bench, there is no doubt in my mind that we have the best referee program around. We haven’t heard any complaining this weekend and all of the games have been refereed in a professional manner," commented McLoughlin.

The Vision Paper congratulates all of the volunteers, players, parents, coaches and fans for making the 19th Renegades Hockey Tournament such a huge success.