FORD Tough Tournament

Ford Tough Tournament

In the First Official Tournament of the season the Vikings needed to turn around quickly for the Saint Joe's Prep win to be competitive. They had a very challenging pool during the morning on Saturday at Haverford HS. Joining the Wood in this tournament were other Catholic League rivals LaSalle and Roman Catholic, perennial Suburban one powers North Penn, CB East and Council Rock North. The Tournament also saw Delaware State Champions Salesianum make the trip from Wilmington and 2013 AA State Semi Finalists Holy Redeemer travel down form the Scranton area. Philadelphia Public league also got in on the action by sending in Northeast (PIAA District 12 Runner Up) and Lincoln HS who is in the 10 team Gold Division. Add in some district qualifying teams from the District 1 Independent League and you have a tough tournament.

Wood was pooled with Council Rock North, Holy Redeemer, Glen Mills, and Unionville. They started off strong playing Glen Mills winning 2-0 behind strong serves and disciplined play. Next up was Unionville. While the outcome was 1-1 for each team the JV team hung with the Unionville team and came within 5 points of winning, while Varsity took their set 25-20. The next match proved to be a tall task in Holy Redeemer. Last year this team fell to Northeastern in the State semifinals and returned 2 middles at 6'7" and 6'9". While the first set was plagued with poor serving, passing and communication, Wood managed to climb back into the match the second game only falling by 7! Redeemer also went on to win the entire tournament besting North Penn in 3 sets! Our final Match of the day was another challenge in SOL National title contender Council Rock North. While the Vikings came up short the play was much better, it also allowed us to put some JV players into key roles for some great experience playing an excellent team. Rock North could go on to the Semi Finals before losing to North Penn. All in all the day was good, we ended tied for 3rd in our pool at 3-5, played some great competition and will look forward to next week when we play Archbishop Ryan, Upper Dublin and Bonner-Prendie.