SWAC advances three entries to SHSAA Badminton Provincials
Congratulations to the SWAC 2023-24 Award winners. The recipients are nominated by schools or they can be considered based on their years of involvement, variety of sport programs involved with, contributions as athletic director/executive member/commissioner.
The deserving recipients this year are:
Senior Service Award - Kerri Keenleyside (Hazlet)
Junior Service Award - Carmen Stevenson (Shaunavon)
Senior Male Coach Adam Jackson (SCCHS)
Senior Female Coach Rea Carlson (Gull Lake)
Officials Award - Valerie Gordon (Swac/eastend)
SHSAA VOLLEYBALL
Congratulations to the Ponteix senior boys volleyball team (with players from Val Marie, Ecole Boreale and Vanguard). They were awarded the SHSAA Sportsmanship banner by SHSAA Assistant Executive Director Jeff Kitts in a special ceremony last week. The team received accolades for their sportsmanship by the officials and SHSAA representatives at their 2A boys provincial championship.
It is a tremendous honor to have this award bestowed on a team. It is exceptionally rare that a host school and a provincial medalist also earns the sportsmanship award. The leadership of coaches Rob Englot and Lori Kendall have a lot to do with this amazing young team. Awesome achievement - you should be very proud!
SENIOR BADMINTON REGIONALS
SWAC sent a full contingent of 10 teams to the SHSAA regional tournament in Rosetown on May 4. They were vying for a top two placing to earn a spot at SHSAA provincials.
Boys Doubles teams, David Cocks/karter Ries (Leader) and Austin Evans/tate Unger (SC), finished second in their respective pools with 2-1 records. Both teams lost in their semi finals. The team of Cocks/ries’s loss was especially heartbreaking, losing 22-20 in the third set to Assiniboia. It was a SWAC match up in the bronze medal game, with Cocks/ Reis defeating Evans/ Unger (2-0).
Gull Lake’s Chase Collier/brynne Leppa
finished third in their girls doubles pool (1-2) and didn’t advance to the playoff round. Natalie Cocks/addison Banks (Leader) finished their round robin pool play with a perfect 3-0 record. Luck didn’t follow them into the semi final, where they lost a tough three-set match (1-2) to Rosetown. The girls rebounded with a decisive win over LCBI in the regional bronze medal game to finish third overall.
In boys singles, Pierce Schmidt (VM) finished his pool with a 3-0 record. Hunter Stock (Hazlet) finished second in his pool (2-1). That meant the two Southwest boys would play each other in the semi final. Pierce won that match two games straight and played in
the final vs Moose Jaw Central, where he lost (0-2) to place second overall. Hunter won his third place game over Waldheim (2-1)
Sharmaine Palaganas (Ponteix) was perfect in round robin play in girls singles (3-0). Tealyn Whitefish (Maple Creek) finished second in her pool (2-1). Just like in the boys singles, the semi final would be a match up of two SWAC athletes. Tealyn played very well and won the match. Sharmaine then regrouped and won the bronze regional title over Delisle (2-0). Tealyn lost a tough three game match against Rosetown (1-2) to finish second.
There was an injury to the SCCHS mixed doubles team in the week leading to regionals, so Walker Brown/kyeina Noval (Maple Creek) advanced to regionals based on their third place finish at SWAC districts. The duo finished fourth in their pool at regionals and didn’t advance to the playoff rounds. Savannah Frey/aydan Buss, also from Maple Creek, were undefeated in round robin play (3-0 record). They won an exciting semi final over Dinsmore (2-1) to play for regional gold. It wasn’t meant to be this day, and they lost in two straight games to Moose Jaw Central to finish second.
Congratulations to the following athletes advancing to SHSAA Badminton Provincials on May 11 in Nipawin.
Boys singles: Pierce Schmidt (Val Marie)
Girls singles: Tealyn Whitefish (Maple Creek)
Mixed Doubles: Savannah Frey/aydan Buss (Maple Creek).
TRACK & FIELD
SCCHS hosted a Pole Vault Clinic on Sunday May 5. The clinic was mandatory for any athlete wanting to pole vault this season. 19 SCCHS and Gull Lake athletes took advantage of this Saskathletic clinic. Thanks to Mandi Tuplin for arranging the opportunity.
Blue section track and field meet is the week of May 20 - tentative date: Tuesday, May 21 in Swift Current.
White section track and field meet is the week of May 20 - tentative date: Wednesday, May 22 in Swift Current.
SWAC district meet is the week of May 27 - tentative date: Wednesday, May 29 in Swift Current.
Provincial track and field (gr 9 and up) is June 7-8 in Saskatoon.
ESPORT
Chinooksd has approved Esport as an approved activity for grade 10-12 and we’ve been working on the logistics of competition formats since February.
The Eastend, Maverick, and Vanguard teams met face to face to have a Chinook windup tournament on Tuesday, April 30. Maverick School in Swift Current had a perfect setup to run the event.
We started with the students having an opportunity to play each of the three games we offer (in a more casual format). After a couple hours of learning new games and friendly competition, we ran a single elimination tournament to establish the first champions of our inaugural tournament.
The Super Smash Bros champions (2 vs 2) were Alex Westbury and Tyson White from Maverick (coached by Colin Smith). The Mario Kart champion (1 vs 1) was Ben Rousseaux from Ponteix (coached by Stephen Mccomish). The Ponteix team actually swept the top three places. By acclamation, the Rocket League champions (3 vs 3) were Lucas Mccuaig, Rowyn Whitney, Mason Osinski from Eastend (coached by Jordan Daigle).