The second annual Peter Molesky Classic played out at the Rotary Spirit Centre Jan. 13-14, hosted by the St. Mary Sharks and bringing in 16 teams from eight 1A schools from around the region.
The St. Mary senior girls team took third in the tournament, while the boys took fifth.
“We definitely didn’t get the results we wanted, we wanted to go at least 2-1,” said boys head coach Darcy Romanuik. “That being said, we have a younger team. A lot of the schools we played were Grade 12 heavy and our effort matched their effort. When you’re a young team and you’re competitive, that’s encouraging.”
Romanuik added that the tournament served as a good way to gage where the Sharks are in comparison to their rivals at this stage of the season.
“We know now what we have to do to get to that next level,” he said. “The kids keep getting better, there’s plenty of time to keep getting better. We just have to put the pedal down and work that much harder to get where we want to go.”
Girls head coach Glenn Schwarz said he was quite happy with how his squad played.
“I thought we did quite well,” said Schwarz. “The girls played great defense. They played a structured game. They’re coming together as a team, rather than individuals. They played for each other and the team did really good.”
Thorsby won the tournament on the girls side and St. Francis took the championship for the boys.
“We’ve only played the one tournament so far,” noted Schwarz. “Our offence is sort of a work in progress, we were missing a lot of open shots, so that’s something we’re going to have to work on. A few things we have to tune up, but that will come with more practice and more game play.”
While the league is slowing down for a few weeks due to exams, both boys and girls are back to practicing, preparing for the quad-school tournament in Camrose coming up in February.
“February to March is a stretch drive,” said Romanuik. “We’ll be playing a lot of games and we’re hoping to make a lot of noise.”
The Peter Molesky Classic is named for a retired teacher/coach from St. Mary, who worked with the senior girls team for over 30 years.
