USL News Release

Wednesday, November 10, 2008

TAMPA – The Northern Virginia Royals ’93 boys, who fell one win short of winning the club’s first boys Super Y-League Championship in last season’s U14 boys finale, will return to headline this season’s U15 boys championship tournament toting a regular season record of 8-2-2. As the second-seeded team out of the South Atlantic Division, the Royals return to the finals will not begin easily as they face the number one seed out of the Mid Atlantic region, Parsippany SC (9-4-2) on Friday, November 21.

Mid Atlantic Division
Coached by Mike Lamarca and Celso Torres, City Islanders Academy’s 9-4-2 record was enough to tie them with Parsippany SC with 29 points in the 16-team Mid-Atlantic region. A strong finish to the season that included three straight wins helped secure the spot.

“Our fifteens had a great season,” said Academy Director David Schofield. “They have improved year after year and really deserve this accomplishment.”

“We have a lot of talented players,” said Coach Lamarca. “But we are not a year-round team. The difficulty is getting the boys playing together as a unit, rather than individuals. The longer the team has played together, the more chemistry we have developed, which is evident by our strong finish.”

After a short break following the season, the team is now resuming practices and plans to be prepared to face the best teams in the U.S and Canada in Tampa.

“We’re going to do our best,” added team manager Brian Fincher. “It’s going to be tough but we look forward to the challenge.”

Parsippany SC finished fourth in the Mid Atlantic with a record of 9-4-2. The New Jersey-based club wrapped up the 2008 summer season even with fellow North American Finalist, City Islanders Academy with 29 points due to their identical records.

Head-to-head with the City Islanders, Parsippany SC won their only meeting, 3-1 to claim sole possession of fourth place. Since dropping a 3-2 decision to the Brooklyn Knights on Sunday, July 6, Parsippany SC has gone unbeaten in three games heading into their first North American Finals match against the Northern Virginia Royals. Coached by Brian Sentowski and Todd Tumelty Parsippany SC scored 28 times in 15 matches. In that period of time the side has also allowed 16 goals, which is tied for the third-best mark in the division.

Midwest Division
Coached by Hector Loranca and Managed by Kim Ashton, the Toronto Lynx ended the regular season with a mark of 8-2-0. They scored 35 goals this season while allowing 14. Nine of the goals they surrendered went to Mequon United and Kalamazoo in back-to-back matches in June. Seemingly a fluke, Toronto is undefeated and holds a 35-5 advantage over their opposition when not playing on June 28 or June 29.

The Chicago Magic Soccer Club boys U15 team is compiled of Chicago’s top youth players from several organizations with individual goals of making the Chicago Magic Soccer Club Academy Team. The team consists of players with many individual and team accomplishments, such as the 2007 Dallas Cup and 2008 Manchester United Cup, which is played in Oregon. Individual notables include: David Caban, Cameron Offer, Sam Hadley, Jayson Leseth and Matt Payne.

The Kalamazoo Kingdom’s U15 boys, one of seven boys and girls teams the club qualified for the North American Finals, ended their regular season even with the Toronto Lynx in Group B of the Midwest Division. Their record was 8-2-0, good enough for 24 points. Head-to-head with Toronto, Kalamazoo had one of the strangest two-game confrontations in the history of the game, losing 6-1 on Saturday, July 28 and winning 6-1 on Sunday, July 29. Coached by Chad Wiseman and Michael Haines, the team netted 32 goals and allowed 16 in 10 matches. Their second match of group play will be their toughest. In that match, they face the 12-0-0 New England Division Champion Ottawa Fury.

New England Division
The Ottawa Fury’s U15 boys were the only perfect Canadian side in the Super Y-League this season. Mountain WFC’s U15 boys ended the regular season unbeaten, but drew three times. A girl’s side, U15 Coastal WFC was also close. They ended the regular season with a record of 6-0-2.

Against their New England Division competition, the Ottawa Fury puzzle was nearly solved on Sunday, July 27 against Seacoast United, but the defenses held and the Fury managed a 1-0 win. No other team in the division would come closer than that as Ottawa outscored their opponents 39-5 on the season. When the team arrives in Tampa for the North American Finals they will first have to steer through competition from the 6-2-2 Abbotsford Mariners. On day two of group play the side will battle the 8-2-0 Kalamazoo Kingdom. Should they survive those two matches, Ottawa will then have a chance to advance to the knockout phase of the competition with a win over the 9-4-2 City Islanders Academy.

This same team earned experience at the U14 North American Finals last season, but following a rough outing in Tampa during the 2007 event, Ottawa is looking to repair their status in the ’94 age pairing this time around. The offseason improvement shown by the Fury has been impressive. They bettered their league record from 9-2-1 last season to 12-0-0 this year by retooling their offense. Last season the side put up 27 goals, this time around they netted 39. The team’s defense required no improvement. They allowed five goals in 12 matches last season and six through 12 games in 2008.

Carryover members of the 2007 Fury include: Brandon Albert, Ryan Brousseau, Simon Brown, Thomas Capstick, Emile Cardinal Soucy, Nagib Hermas, Adrian Hiotis, Matthew Kaminski, Tyler Lewars, Aidan McParland, Chris Medina, Solamon Schroeter.

This was an exciting season for the Black Watch SC Highlanders, beginning with the appointment of two new staff coaches, Steve Freeman and Jake Boland. Throughout this year, the Highlanders were challenged at the highest levels at such tournaments as the Las Vegas Cup, the Jefferson Cup, the Potomac Cup, the U.S. Regionals in Pittsgrove, NJ, the Score Showcase in Greensboro, NC and the Surf Cup in San Diego, California, where the team finished as semi-finalists. The Highlanders were invited to participate at the Middlesbrough Youth Academy in England and attended two Premiership games while in England. The Highlanders were tough competitors in the New England division of the Super Y-League, where the team was in contention for the division championship until the final weekend of the season.

Northwest Division
The Abbotsford Mariners, coached by former NASL Whitecaps coach Alan Errington, kept pace with the prolific scoring offense of division champion, Mountain WFC. The Mariners ended the season with 31 goals for, a single goal off the pace set by Mountain WFC. That goals per game average of 3.1 afforded the side a bit of leeway defensively and the side was able to outscore the upset-minded Thompson Okanagan side on two occasions, a season-opening 2-1 win and a 5-2 mid-season victory. However, the defense got stingy when it mattered most, pitching two shutouts against fourth-place Coastal WFC and refusing to soften in a 0-0 stalemate with the Washington Crossfire.

Mountain WFC U15 boys finished first in the Northwest Division by putting together an undefeated season with a record of 7-0-3. That record assures the team a returning position in the Super Y-League North American Finals in Tampa, Florida. The side scored a total of 32 goals in 10 games while allowing only five. The team was helped by a strong defense but their overall success was due to a well balanced squad. Qualification for the finals is a great achievement and the players are looking forward to meeting strong opposition.

Northern California Division
Juventus SC took the Northern California Division with a mark of 8-1-1. The team, coached by Guillermo and Angela Talancon, scored 28 times and allowed 12 goals in ten games for a goal differential of +16. Against Diablo FC, the second North California qualifier, Juventus won 2-1 and 3-1. Their only loss of the season was 4-1 to the Cal Odyssey. In their first match at the North American Finals, Juventus will face the Chicago Magic. As if that were not a tough enough test, Juventus will face Parsippany SC the following day before wrapping up group play against the Northern Virginia Royals on Sunday, November 23.

The fourth team in this dangerous group is Diablo FC out of the Super Y-League’s Northern California Division. Diablo ended the regular season with a record of 6-3-1. That total was good enough for a second place finish in the division behind Juventus Sport Club. Juventus, who won 3-1 and 2-1 over Diablo during the regular season, will be placed in Group A. The two clubs would only meet again if both teams made it to the U15 Boys North American Championship.

The team has relied on their stout defense to carry them through the season and has steadily filled in the holes as the year progressed. Heading into this tough cross-country tournament, Diablo FC has allowed only two goals in their last six games, four of which were shutouts.

South Atlantic Division
For the second year in a row, the Northern Virginia Royals U15 Super Y-League team’s second place finish in their South Atlantic Division bracket proved enough to gain entry into the North American Finals. The U15 Royals join the U17 Royals, U16 Royals, U14Royals and U17 Majestics for the trip to Florida and the chance at a North American title.

The U15 Royals (8-2-2) finished the season two points behind the FC Fredericksburg Gunners (9-2-1) in Group B of the Division but swept all four teams in Group A to ultimately qualify for the championship tournament. The Royals finished the season with four straight wins, outscoring their opponents 15-3 in the final twelve days of the season. The U15 Royals only two losses of the season came at the hands of FC Fredericksburg.

The upstart Northern Virginia U15 boys recently finished second in the 2008 U.S. Club Soccer National Championships. After sweeping the regional tournament and advancing through their group in the national tournament, the U15 Royals dropped a 2-1 decision to Lobitos Velocity (Canada) in the U.S. Club Soccer Championship Match.

After two years of hard work, the Gunners’ U15 Boys reached their goal of qualifying for the North American Finals after winning their division with authority. Gunners started the season a little slow by drawing one and losing one in the first three matches but they were quick to get on track with an impressive eight consecutive wins which guaranteed them a ticket to Tampa, Florida.
“It was a special season with some very special players,” said U15 Coach Cristian Neagu. “They made it look easy but it wasn’t. We played some very tough opposition (Northern Virginia Royals, Richmond Strikers, Richmond Kickers and Triangle) and I am really proud of them.”

“It is a tremendous opportunity and great exposure for our boys in Fredericksburg to be able to compete in tournament like this one,” added Neagu. “I realize the difficulty of this task but one thing is for sure, we are going to play our hardest. We will make the most of this experience.”

Southeast Division
Sunrise SC advanced to the North American Finals out of the 10-team Southeast Division, winning Group B with a record of 11-1-1. Their only loss of the season was a 2-1 defeat at the hands of Orlando SC in the third match of the season. Since that match, Sunrise has peeled off a 10 game unbeaten streak including landmark victories over big-name clubs Schulz Academy and Kendall SC. Fittingly, the one match Sunrise didn’t win in their last ten regular season games was a dramatic 4-4 draw with Southeast Group A Champion H.C. United.

H.C. United won the Southeast Division’s Group A with a record of 9-2-2. Coached by Eric Sims and Fabio Suarez, the side overcame the adversity brought on by one of the top clubs in North America, Schulz Academy. After suffering a 2-1 loss to Schulz on Saturday, June 21, the second game of H.C. United’s season, the West Floridians rebounded on the road to win 2-0. Their season series split at one game apiece, H.C. United excelled against Group B competition, winning 3-1 over Weston SC to advance to the North American Finals. That match was the difference in winning the group as Weston downed Schulz 2-1 on Wednesday, August 6.

Southern California Division
West Coast FC tied with two other clubs, South Bay Force Blue and Pateadores Blue, to finish third in the Super Y-League’s Southern California Division with a record of 5-2-4. Of the three clubs, West Coast FC had the best offense. They scored 2.18 goals per game against arguably the best competition in the U.S. Head-to-head with Pateadores Blue and the South Bay Force Blue, West Coast FC tied back-to-back matches 1-1 (South Bay) and 2-2.