The old diesels: U18-GT1 Storm the first top-tier girls team in St. Marys Minor Soccer history

The U18 Girls Tier One St. Marys Storm are the first-ever girls’ St. Marys Minor Soccer team to play in the first tier.

By Spencer Seymour

This season marked a major notch in the record books for St. Marys Minor Soccer, with the association fielding its first-ever tier-one girls squad with its U18-GT1 team.

Head coach Nathan Brown said the team’s ascension to their league’s top tier has been years in the making, including last season when they won a league title and district cup in the third tier.

“We’ve been toying with it for the last couple of years,” said Brown. “All things considered, we could have done it last year, but the girls that were graduating last year, they needed that championship. They needed that district cup, coming up through tier three, building their skills for seven years. There was a bunch of them I had for seven years and they graduated with two massive trophies, which was awesome. Now, we’re at tier one and we’re trying to do the same thing.”

Brown added the squad has reached the league’s top division thanks to years of growing their understanding of every little detail of the game.

“They all understand the game,” Brown said. “We can talk about things and I’m not having squirrely eyes looking at me like, ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’ Building over those years, we’re at a place that we’re finally at tier one and we’re going toe to toe with some of the best teams in (the Elgin-Middlesex Soccer Association) right now. It’s pretty awesome to watch.”

With an incredibly strong roster led by veteran linchpins including Marin Chateauvert, Bronwyn Hawkins, Maddie Monisit Brown and Charlotte Richardson, the team has blossomed into a powerhouse in the Elgin Middlesex Soccer Association (EMSA), with, as of the Independent’s press time, just one loss so far this season.

Chateauvert and Hawkins said the group has a strong work ethic that pulses through the veins of each member of the roster.

“To me, (playing tier one) is just good recognition for all the hard work we’ve been putting in through these years, and constantly showing up to practice, having our extra training sessions, everyone working together,” Chateauvert said. “There’s not really one person who isn’t fully committed. Everyone’s committed and everyone’s always showing up.”

“It feels good to know that all our hard work has paid off and helped us get to where we are today,” Hawkins echoed. “We’re always pushing each other to be our best in practices and having fun in our mini-games and drills. We’re getting a lot better at incorporating crosses and getting switches in and all that stuff to really dominate our games.”

The team’s rise to becoming the first St. Marys girls’ team to play tier-one soccer not only came after dominating in the third tier, but, going back even further, according to Hawkins and Monisit Brown, spending their early years in soccer together not near the top of the standings.

“The past few seasons we’ve been able to be at the top of the tier-three standings,” said Hawkins. “It’s really great to be tier one this year and playing really well and still be at the top of the standings and grow together.”

“It’s a great step up because when we were much younger, around U9, we lost 13 straight games or something like that,” Monisit Brown recalled. “So, it’s great to have our confidence built up this much that we can go tier one in U18 in our final year, especially with the older girls setting all the 2010s up for next year to go back into tier one as well.”

The years of growing together, both as players and people, has forged a tight-knit bond amongst the group that is no small part of their on-field success.

“I think the biggest part is how well we get along,” Chateavuert said. “Everyone’s friends. We are always joking on and off the field at practice, even when Nathan (Brown) doesn’t want us to be. We’re always joking, always laughing, always talking, and so we built that bond that translates to playing the game and being able to know where each other will be on the field.”

“The bond that we have is really special,” said Richardson. “We’re all supportive to each other. We love being together on the bench even. Everyone’s contributing, whether they’re on the field or on the bench, we cheer each other on. Everyone wants the best for each other and we just support each other. I think that makes us so special.”

Brown described that closeness as manifesting itself in “consistent positivity and pressure.”

“They’re always saying, ‘We can do it, let’s go, come on, we know we can do it, play for each other, dig in,’ and the leaders on the team, they get out front and bring the team with them,” Brown said. “They all get along off the field. They’re doing gatherings off the field and outside of work. They’ve all bought into what we wanted to do at the start of the year, and we had a criterion of how often they had to get here and how much time they need to put into it, and it’s been pretty cool to watch them execute.”

Richardson added, above all else, the Storm’s familiarity built up over the years has led to an uncanny ability to know where one another will be on the pitch.

“I think our ball movement is really the key thing,” Richardson said when discussing the team’s success. “Our communication is really good. We’ve all bonded and got closer on the field and off the field, so that helps us move the ball and know where each other needs to be. Even if we don’t say it, we know how to pass and we know where we’re going to go and we just move around the field really well together now.”

Of course, the development the girls have experienced throughout the years doesn’t happen without the work of a dedicated coaching staff, with Brown leading a trio that also includes highly skilled coaches in Mark Muir and Andrea Thompson. All four veteran players, including Monisit Brown and Chateauvert, had positive reviews of their tough-but-fair and fun coaches.

“They’re hard enough on us to the point that we understand how far we need to go,” Monisit Brown said. “If we push their buttons too much, they’re super hard on us, but otherwise they’re super fun, but they still push us.”

“They know how far we can go,” added Chateauvert. “And so, they’re hard on us because they want to get us to that point. Their coaching has given us the ability to be confident with how we play and how we move the ball around.”

As a bench boss for this core of girls in both hockey and soccer, Brown began describing the girls as the “old diesels,” a playful descriptor used to explain the team always performing much better in the second half of games.

“It was something that was given to us just because we start so late, but honestly, my dad’s not wrong about it,” Monisit Brown admitted. “He gave it to us because every game we start in the second half, which is why he makes us come an hour early now. But honestly, it’s very fitting, and it shows us that if, as he puts it, ‘you are the old diesels, you guys aren’t going to be able to win these games,’ and I think it just puts it into perspective on what we need to do.”

However, through all the learning experiences, their “old diesel” moments and the countless hours of work put in by both players and coaches, now, the team can proudly lay claim to being the first girls’ team in St. Marys to play tier-one minor soccer. However, for Brown, he doesn’t foresee this being the last.

“Hopefully, number one, it motivates the competitive young girls in lower age groups. The U9 competitive girls, there are a bunch of firecrackers on that team and I can see them playing this level when they get there. This year, we’ve only got five graduating players, 13 are staying with a couple more joining the fold next year.

“Hopefully, they stay tier one and keep infusing that compete level,” Brown continued. “And that will mean the graduating girls this year have done their job, and hopefully towns outside of St. Marys go, ‘Holy smokes, they have a tier one program, I want to go there and compete with them.’ ”