ASC Freedom shines at 3v3 Nationals

Once again, Congratulations to the ASC Freedom girls for another remarkable achievement in their short history- 2nd place at the 2006 National 3v3 Championship Tournament in Orlando, Florida. The championship tournament, sponsored by Sports Illustrated at Disney Wide World of Sports® Resort is the largest 3v3 soccer tournament in the world and includes the best of the best from all 50 states of the US as well as from Canada and Mexico. Participation at the championship tournament is earned through a selective qualification process that starts with about 65 local events all over the US, Canada and Mexico. The top 5 teams in each age bracket at the local events advance to 8 regional tournaments. The top 5 teams at the regionals advance to the national championship tournament. Starting with about 500 teams in the Freedom's age bracket at the local level, the nation's best 34 teams advanced to the national championship tournament in Florida.

At the National Championship in Orlando the Freedom played the following teams in order: New York, North Carolina, Texas, Maryland, Georgia, Ohio, Texas, and after playing all of these teams advanced to the Championship game against an Indiana team.

On the first day of the tournament, the nations top 34 teams in the U9 division went through pool play. Each pool had 4 teams playing one another. The Freedom completed the pool stage with 2 wins and a narrow loss to the #4 nationally ranked team.

With elimination play starting on the second day, the Freedom played 2 very strong teams. Through both games the girls showed tremendous spirit in the face of some very physical play, winning both games and qualifying for the quarterfinals.

Very little separated the last 8 teams, which included the top 3 nationally ranked teams, that were left at the quarter-finals stage on day 3 of the tournament. In the quarterfinals the Freedom girls took some hard knocks. But they stayed composed and by doing so handily won the game through superior skills and teamwork.

The semi-final against a very talented and outstandingly coached team of girls from Texas (National Rank 13, defeated the nationally #1 ranked team in their quarterfinal) was a true test of not only the girls skills, but also their spirit and determination. Having played 6 games in two and a half days against highly skilled and sometimes very physical opposition under very hot and humid conditions, they came from 2 goals down in the second half to force overtime and win the game by a golden goal. Simply awesome.

The National Championship game came down to the ASC Freedom playing the Carmel Inferno 98 from Indiana (National #3, defeated #2 in the other semifinal). In a very tightly contested, passionate and low-scoring game that could have gone either way, the Inferno held on to edge the Freedom 3-2. Congratulations to both teams for an outstanding result.

National Indoor Championships, here we come!!!