Martensville Maddogs Kyren Houmphanh, Treagan Green-Edmonds and Wyatt LaRoche earned their spot to join the Saskatchewan Selects team after completing tryouts this past summer.
According to Sam Houmphanh, President of the Martensville Maddogs, the Sask Selects program was created by Zeljko and Deb Stefanovic in 2011, for kids who wanted to continue to train and develop their football skills over the winter months.
“This year represents their 10-year anniversary of the program, and they firmly believe in and encourage the kids to pursue their dreams of playing football while obtaining post-secondary education,” said Houmphanh.
In February 2012, the program started an annual International Pigskin Tournament where players get a chance to train for an extended season and compete against US teams. “Tryouts for Selects were July and August for the teams traveling to Las Vegas,” said co-creator Deb Stefanovic.
This year, joining the Sask Selects team gave them the opportunity to be part of this very competitive tournament in Vegas where other teams competing in the tournament have won their respective city and/or state championships. “To my knowledge, until this season, there has not been another group from Saskatchewan to go to Vegas,” said Houmphanh.
“We had three teams registered in the tournament with U13, U14 and U15 competing at a high level against the US teams winning two out of the three age categories.”
The U15 and U14 teams brought home gold with Green-Edmonds and LaRoche contributing in the U14 category. Houmphanh brought home silver with the U13 team. “The Selects family really showed up and had a very successful tournament,” said Houmphanh.
Congratulations to Wyatt LaRoche, Treagen Green-Edmonds, and Kyren Houmphanh! You made Saskatchewan and most of all Martensville proud, as stated on the Maddogs Football Facebook page.
PHOTO CAPTION: Kyren Houmphanh, Wyatt LaRoche and Treagen Green-Edmonds
