Once upon a time, a rather well-known member of the NWT sport community told me my columns were usually angry rants from an angry individual.
I know where she's coming from because all I do is rant sometimes. Ask the newsroom.
This column, though, isn't an angry rant. By the subject matter of the headline, you are expecting it. Alas, this is where I will tell you about how a team that didn't win a game and still managed to play some of the best outdoor soccer ever played by a team at the national level.
This is a story about the Yellowknife Bay Soccer Club, known colloquially as the Sundogs, and their recent trip to the U-15 Cup in Calgary. It was a national championship, which when most people read it, the snarky remarks begin. I've been guilty of it before in these pages where I take a shot about our teams going to a national championship will try their best, make new friends and come home safely.
All without a win and usually being knocked out six ways from Sunday.
The Sundogs, though, were different. When I saw the scoreline against Newfoundland and Labrador in their first contest, I had to do a double-take.
1-0.
Come again? They lost but … 1-0?
Even more of a surprise was that they had a chance to at least come away with a draw. They hit the crossbar and had it hit the right side of the bar, it was in because the Newfie keeper had absolutely no chance to grab it.
Their next game against Manitoba was always going to be a tough one and it was but considering recent girls results in outdoor soccer (see the Canada Summer Games), giving up just five goals in two games was not only a moral victory but a victory for confidence.
There was no playoff spot, off to the placing round for the Sundogs and that's where the girls began to show that we weren't the stat-padders we normally are for the rest of the country.
They scored a goal – twice – in games against New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island; they even drew with New Brunswick, 1-1. A draw. Losing 1-0 was something but a draw at a national championship?
The one loss that hurt was their last game against Yukon. It was a 2-0 defeat in that eventual meeting between the North whenever a national championship rolls around. It's the one game you want – and need – to win. The unofficial Northern championship, if you will. There was that one play where a Yukon defender “cleared” the ball off the goal line but you'll never convince me that it wasn't in.
NWT Soccer posted a video of the play and the Yukon defender was standing inside the net. If you're standing inside the net to clear the ball and happen to be seven feet tall, chances are it's crossed the line.
Now, some of you may think I'm being a smart-ass when reading this but I was genuinely shocked. Pleasantly, even. There are only so many times you can write about a blowout loss and try to make it sound even remotely palatable. Even the coaches I speak to about a blowout loss have a tough time to put a positive spin on it.
Talking to head coach Joe Acorn, though, he spoke like a coach who knew he had a team that was ready to compete and held their own.
And he's right.
photo courtesy of Rob Hart
These ladies did more than hold their own, they took the play to their southern counterparts. It's not often we have the provinces on their heels but more than once, the Sundogs looked like a team to be reckoned with. Acorn was also right when he said the provinces usually come in with the belief that they'll be able to smoke us out but they got a wake-up call.
I'd say. I wasn't there but you know some of these provincial coaches weren't expecting what they got from us. If they were to give interviews, they would wax poetic about how we're really coming along and the sport really seems to be growing in the North.
They wouldn't admit to what they really wanted to say: We were genuinely shocked that you actually scored on us, let alone get a shot on goal and we thought you would run out of gas by the end of the first half. And why didn't you simply lie down and let us score 10? You weren't following the script, dammit!
Don't you love it when that happens? I do because I'm a spiteful kind of guy. I love it when the team that doesn't roll over and play dead rolls up and plays like it's the last thing they have left to do in life. In layperson's terms, we call them underdogs and no region of the country knows the underdog role better than us.
We do have flashes of brilliance like this. You'll recall the 2016 National Aboriginal Hockey Championships where Team North's boys outfit got a silver medal. Another example of a team that had been the doormats of a tournament for years but showed up to play one year and stunned the country. Again, the provincial teams at that tournament weren't expecting it and it was beautiful to watch.
The small victories are what we look for and that's what the Sundogs got. You could say at least they didn't get blown away and they didn't but they deserved a better fate, in my humble opinion. Let's get ready for the next one because it's coming sooner than you think.
See? Not an angry rant at all.