Vol 3_No 1 Guts.indd - Rubber Magazine

By Alex Dodt
State Wars III in Chicago was
by far the most successful State
Wars tournament so far for Arizona
teams.
After winning three medals in
2005 and four medals in 2006, Arizona
squads equaled that combined total
with seven medals in all in 2007.
Two teams, the 1995 A team and the
Women’s AAA team, won their divisions
after only
one Arizona team
won a State Wars
championship in
all of the fi rst two
years.
“It was a great
feeling,” said
Arizona Women’s
coach Javier
Zuniga. “You
could see the
look on the girls
faces how much it
meant to them to
win it all.”
The women’s
team surprised
many with how
successful they
were in Chicago.
With a strong
club assembled of
great players from
all parts of the state, Team Arizona
went undefeated in round robin. The
only blemish on their record was a 4-
4 tie against Michigan. They made up
for it in the playoffs, though, as Team
America selection Allie Era scored
two goals for a 3-2 semifi nal win over
Michigan.
“Allie was big that game for us,”
Zuniga said. “The biggest thing was
the girls all kept their composure and
stayed in it like they knew they were
going to win.”
In the fi nal, Courtney Render
scored late in the fi rst period on an
assist from Rebekah Zuniga to put
Arizona in the lead. Colorado tied
26
Inline Hockey
AZ takes home 7 medals at State Wars
it up with fi ve minutes left, but the
score didn’t stay tied for long. With
4:30 left in the game, Render scored
her second goal of the game, this
time assisted by Era, to make it 2-1.
Goaltender Chelsea Wilkinson shut
down Colorado the rest of the way to
fi nish with nine saves on 10 shots as
Arizona clinched the AAA championship.
“The girls gelled together well for
not having played together before,”
Arizona’s women’s squad won the AAA championship at State Wars III, marking only the
second AAA State Wars title in Arizona history.
Zuniga said. “They played as a team
and deserved it.”
The 1995 Selects team had a great
run of their own in the 1995 A division
in Chicago. A balanced attack in
the quarterfi nal resulted in a 5-3 win
over Wisconsin and a great defensive
effort earned the team a 2-1 victory
against Georgia in the semifi nal. In
the championship game, Tanner
Tuohy scored a pair of clutch goals,
both assisted by Megan Amimoto,
to lift Arizona to a 4-2 victory over
Pennsylvania.
“The 95’s were a great young
group,” state director Dan Maxwell
said. “They were fun to watch.”
Three Arizona teams - 1997 Selects,
Junior and Senior teams - all
won silver medals in the AA divisions.
Ben Jackson, of Yuma, led
the 1997 team to an exciting overtime
win in the semifi nal before they lost
in the fi nal against Texas.
“Ben’s a great young player,” Maxwell
said. “He knows how to put the
puck in the net.”
The Junior and Senior Arizona
teams had similar rosters and similar
endings. Led by
the scoring of
Duane Jones
and Tyler Koressel
and the
goaltending of
Cody O’Reilly,
the Junior team
pulled of an overtime
upset in the
semifi nal against
Team Missouri.
They fell short in
the fi nal though,
losing to Connecticut.
The Arizona
Senior team, with
several players
from the Junior
team, snuck out
of the semifi nal
with a 5-4 win over
Illinois, but they
too fell short in the fi nal, losing 3-0 to
New Jersey.
“We defi nitely exceeded our
expectations by winning two medals,”
Jones said. “We surprised some
teams and helped put on Arizona on
the map.”
The fi nal two Arizona teams to
medal, the 1992 and 1991 select
teams, both won bronze medals.
One of Arizona’s most recognizable
teams at State Wars, the 1990
Selects, fell short of making the semifi
nals for the third consecutive year
when they lost 3-2 in the quarterfi nal
to the eventual champions, Team
Illinois. ❂