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San Francisco CalHeat wins 4th Annual Santa Clarita Tournament

Mon, 03/23/2009 - 13:36 — smayer73

SantapicThe CalHeat San Francisco Bay Area Team Handball Club wins the 4th Annual Santa Clarita tournament against teams from the Los Angeles area and Santa Clarita.

 

 

Final Standings:

Pos. Team Name W L T GS GA Pts
1. San Francisco CalHeat 2 1 0 99 76 4
2. Los Angeles TH 1 2 1 0 94 84 4
3. TH Santa Clarita 2 1 0 91 85 4
4. Los Angeles TH 2 0 3 0 67 100 0

Final Game Results:

TH Santa Clarita : Los Angeles TH 1             26:33 (14:20)

San Francisco CalHeat : Los Angeles TH 2    34:16 (16:10)

TH Santa Clarita : Los Angeles TH 2             33:21 (16:10)

San Francisco CalHeat : Los Angeles TH 1    34:28 (20:14)

Los Angeles TH 1 : Los Angeles TH 2            33:30 (14:14)

San Francisco CalHeat : TH Santa Clarita     31:32 (14:18)

The tournament commenced on Saturday morning with the highly anticipated local derby between TH Santa Clarita and Los Angeles TH 1. Against all expectations it was LA TH 1 and not the host who came out firing from all cylinders. Before Santa Clarita could wake up, LA already established a comfortable lead of 5 to 6 goals. This  lead remained constant throughout the whole first half and the score was settled with 20:14 at halftime.  Nothing changed during the second half. Except that the host got more and more frustrated and the physicality of the game increased. However LA TH 1 used all their experience and in the end cruised to an easy and never endangered victory of 33:26.

The second game featured the heavy favorite of SF CalHeat and the new formed team of LA TH 2. Again the game started out very surprising. The young LA TH 2 team played very easygoing  and was able to keep the game close for the first 10 minutes. Only after that CalHeat slowly started to pull away and opened a 16:10 gap at halftime. Some strong words must have been spoken during the halftime on CaHeat’s side, since the team came out of the break much more focused and took complete control of the game. Now the inexperience of the young LA TH 2 team started to show and CalHeat kept increasing their lead to 34:16 until the final whistle blew.
The third game between Santa Clarita and LA TH 2 was the last chance for either team to keep their hopes alive to have a shot at winning the tournament. The host team was the first team to grab that chance and immediately put the LA TH 2 team under pressure. The LA TH 2 team was struggling to hold on, but managed to give Santa Clarita only a 16:10 lead at half time. However the second half showed pretty much the same picture. LA TH 2 was holding on to their dear life and Santa Clarita played out all their routine and finished the game with a 33:21 victory.
The last game of the day saw the two winners of SF CalHeat and LA TH 1 going against each other. This time CalHeat looked focused and poised to control the game from the start. LA TH 1 tried very hard to keep up, but CalHeat marched on and opened a 20:14 lead at halftime. At the beginning of the second half LA TH 1 mobilized everything and tried to come back into the game. The Phisicality of the game increased. However CalHeat kept pushing back and took the game with a 34:28 victory.
Sunday morning the two LA teams went against each other. Both teams were missing a couple of players compared to the day before. Therefore the game looked more like a scrimmage game than a competitive tournament game, which lead to a halftime score of 14:14. The second half was very similar. Except that LA TH 1 finally used their experience to get a 2 to 3 goal lead. This lead remained until the end and LA TH 1 ended up with a close 33:30 victory.
The last game of the tournament had the host team of Santa Clarita facing the unbeaten team of SF CalHeat. From the beginning Santa Clarita was very determined to win this game. Compared to their last game CalHeat started a little bit less focused, but was able to stay in the lead for the first 15 Minutes of the game. Then Santa Clarita increased their pressure, while CalHeat seemed to have lost their game. Especially in the defense, where Santa Clarita got to score without any resistance. This and some very strange decision by the referees lead to a very surprising 18:14 lead for Santa Clarita at halftime. During the halftime CalHeat tried to restructure themselves. At the beginning of the second half the defense was finally reinforced and the offense became more powerful. However the inconsistency of the referees continued. At the same time Santa Clarita remained though-minded and executed all their shots successfully. That allowed the gap to be closed only by one or two goals. This motivated CalHeat even further and the team started to push harder and harder. The lead kept shrinking and Santa Clarita looked more and more nervous. 25 seconds before the end CalHeat was finally able to tie the score at 31 : 31. The clock was running down without Santa Clarita having a clear scoring chance. When the referee pair decided to take the outcome of the game and the tournament in their own hands, by awarding a very controversial 7m penalty shot to Santa Clarita two seconds before the end of the game after one of their players seemingly lost the ball at the 9 Meter line without having a clear and open shot. Santa Clarita accepted the present and converted the penalty shot for a 32:31 victory.