Vipers’ State Games dynasty rolls to Hockeytown USA

By Phillip Brents

Posted Aug. 4, 2003

Vipers coach Gene Garcia knows his team well. He’s been coaching a core group that includes his sons Richard and Arturo for the past nine years. So when the team faced off in the 20-and-under Division at this year’s California State Games inline hockey tournament, the elder Garcia knew exactly how his squad would respond: With another gold medal.

"When we showed up and saw all these top players — big and fast guys — the guys on my team at first said we weren’t going to win. But then I told them that our team had been together a long time and that we should just go out there and show those other teams what we could do," Garcia said.

This year’s three-team championship finals, held July 11-12 at Skate San Diego in National City, were preceded by a four-team qualifying tournament that featured play in three divisions: 14-and-under, 17-and-under and 20-and-under.

Scheduling problems prevented the 17-and-under division from being held (the Comets, the first place team in the qualifying tournament, went on to play in the Gold Division at the NARCh Finals later that month in Florida and reached the first playoff round before being eliminated by the Mission Marvel Surfers). However, finals play was conducted in both the 14-and-under and 20-and-under divisions, with the Chula Vista Golden Eagles (14U) and Vipers (20U) returning to defend their top qualifying tournament finishes.

Both the Golden Eagles and Vipers would face adversity in the finals tournament, but the Vipers were able to skate past it to claim the gold medal. Team North County won the 14U Division with a 6-3 victory against the Golden Eagles while the Hosers finished with the bronze medal.

Teams played a round-robin in the 20U Division, with the Vipers and West Coast Panthers opening play with a 2-2 tie. The Panthers defeated the Misfits, 9-3, in the next game and the Vipers followed with an 8-3 victory against the Misfits to match the Panthers’ 1-0-1 record. The Vipers received the bye to the championship game based on goal-differential while the Panthers and Misfits met in a one-game playoff.

The Misfits pulled off a surprise 6-2 win against the Panthers to help spice up the finals but the rested Vipers proved to be the fresher team by posting a 6-2 victory in the championship game.

Coach Garcia credited teamwork as a key to his team’s win.

"The other teams may have got a little too confident. But I’ve always told my players that passing is the name of the game, and we kept passing. The whole team was in it. There was not just one player responsible for us winning," he said.

The State Games title was the fourth consecutive for the Vipers, who jump-started their gold medal dynasty with back-to-back 14U Division championships before moving up to win last year’s 17U Division.

Gene Garcia noted that only two of the players on this year’s team were 18. The rest of the players on the team would have still qualified for the 17U division.

Leading the Vipers to this year’s State Games gold medal were Richard and Arturo Garcia, Everett Hinojosa, Joey Galeno, Erick Morgan, Donny McGraw, Reuben Felizardo, Chad McElroy, Brandon Schaeffer and goaltender Tommy Prewitt.

The two Garcia brothers, Hinojosa and McGraw have been playing together as a unit for nearly a decade while Prewitt has backstopped the team to its State Games gold medal collection.

By winning this year’s California State Games title, the Vipers qualified to compete in the Junior Olympic National Championships, scheduled July 31 to Aug. 10 in Detroit, Mich. Considering the Vipers’ record for success, it seemed only appropriate the team would eventually make a pilgrimage to Hockeytown USA.

"That’s one of the reasons the parents on my team wanted us to play in the State Games, so we could go back to Detroit," Garcia said. "I think we have a team. It’s a 20-and-under division and we have a young team. We’re anxious to go, they’re hungry to win."
The Vipers coach said he would like to personally recognize assistant coach Tom Prewitt for his years of service in directing the team’s defense.

Joining the Vipers in Detroit for the Junior Olympic tournament were the Panthers (all three teams that qualified for the State Games finals tournament were eligible to compete in the national championships). Panthers coach Lyn Dyer estimated it would cost the team’s sponsor, West Coast Bag Ladies, about $6,000 to send the team back to Michigan.

"The players are pumped. It costing our sponsor six grand to go," said Dyer, who would like to personally thank Dianne Myers, West Coast Bag Ladies company president.

The Panthers roster includes defensemen Doug Lentz, Anthony Simon and Tommy Neer, forwards Jon Oberg, Lance Dyer, Erick Syktich, Nathan Sigmund and Vince Rappleyea and goaltender Louie Valentine. Sigmund, who helped lead La Jolla County Day High School to this year’s Kiwanis Cup championship en route to earning the CIF-Metro Conference Player of the Year award, is being recruited to play ice hockey at the Junior ranks this coming season along with San Diego Junior Gulls teammate Dan Comrie. 

This year’s AAU Junior Olympic Games features 34 sports and 17,000 athletes. The inline hockey tournament stands out in that players 18 and younger will be evaluated for try-outs in Lake Placid, N.Y., for the 2004 Team USA Junior World Championship team. Thirty players will be invited to the selection camp.

In addition, players 19-20 years old will be evaluated to try out for the 2004 U.S. men’s World Championship team while players from the 12U and 14U divisions will be evaluated for invitation to a Team USA Prospects Camp to help further their careers. Girls from the 16U and 19U divisions will be eligible for try-outs for the 2004 U.S. women’s World Championship team.
Elite and Competitive divisions will be conducted at U.S. Blades Arena in West Bloomfield, Mich.,in 6U to 20U age groups, plus a High School Division. Play in the Girls Division will include 12U, 16U and 19U age groups.

Members of the 2003 AAU All-American teams (selected from the Elite Division) will compete in the AAU All-American Showcase Game.

The Vipers and Panthers are the only two California teams entered in the 20U Division that features teams from throughout the greater Detroit area, nearby Ontario, Canada, New Orleans, New Jersey, Maryland, Ohio, New York and Kentucky as well as international teams from Brazil, Great Britain and Mexico.

Both California squads look to tangle with some heavy hitters in Michigan. The Labeda Xtreme (Cleveland) enters the AAU national championship tournament ranked third in the nation (behind the Long Island Mission Snipers and Detroit Mission Stars — the Snipers won this year’s NARCh Division I Platinum championship while the Stars were a quarterfinalist in the Junior Platinum Division at NARCh).

Other powerhouse teams include Sarnia (Ontario, Canada) and the Detroit-based Tour Bordercats. The Bordercats finished second in the Junior Division at this year’s NARCh Finals while the Sarnia name is synonymous with greatness to anyone familiar with Canadian youth roller hockey. In all, this year’s AAU National Championships will feature five of the top 10 teams ranked in the nation.

The Panthers will square off against No. 8-ranked Crescent City (New Orleans) in their first game on Aug. 8 and follow with contests against Team Great Britain, the No. 9-ranked Detroit Sin Bandits and Center Circle Titans (New Jersey). The Vipers, who will also compete in the 17U Division, hope to sink their fangs into the likes of the Detroit Rapids, No. 3-ranked Labeda Xtreme and Long Island United.

The Silicon Valley Quakes are entered in the 17U Division and will play the Buffalo Firebirds, Gear Mid America and Michigan Timberwolves (Gold Division at NARCh).