SUNRISE SOCCER
Work Hard, GET GOOD


Sunrise Wins Palm Bay Challenge

Palm Bay, Florida (May 7, 2006) - The Sunrise Sting U9 girls won the Palm Bay Challenge championship over the Port St. Lucie Hurricanes by a 3-0 score. Sunrise, playing in the first division of this tournament, swept the entire field against some good competition. The Sting have now won four tournaments in a row.

The girls continue to improve and the results showed again in this tournament. In the first two games, Sunrise had the opportunity to play the top two teams in the Brevard Youth Soccer League. Game one was against the second place Indialantic Force (5-1-1). Sunrise scored in the first minute and then added a second goal in the second half and won by a 2-1 score. The second game of the day was against Brevard's first place, and undefeated, Space Coast Storm (6-0-1). Sunrise jumped out to a 3-0 lead, but Space Coast came back strong midway through the second half, and made the game 3-2. Sunrise scored again with about three minutes to play to insure the 4-2 victory. Sydney Talbot, Taylor Shore and Julia Jaffe had important goals in this game. Melissa Curran and Mary Amos were very effective on defense.

The semi-final game was against south Florida rival Wellington. Wellington and Sunrise have had many competitive games of late, including a 3-3 tie at the Region A jamboree. Wellington was coming off a second place performance at the Countryside Easter tournament. However, the Wave suffered two injuries there, and that might have hurt them against Sunrise. The Sting took advantage of a few corner kicks, and added a couple of other goals in route to a 5-2 victory and a trip to the championship game.

Sunrise was paired up with the Port St. Lucie Hurricanes for the title. PSL came out very strong early on and got several shots off in the first ten minutes. Sunrise keeper Valerie Weinbrum did a great job keeping the Sting in the game. But the tide slowly turned and at the 12 minute mark Weinbrum punted the ball almost the entire length of the field and Julia Jaffe shot the ball inside the far post from about 15 yards out to give Sunrise the 1-0 lead. At 23 minutes, Rylee Simons took the ball from deep inside the Sunrise defensive end, all the way down the touch line into the box, beat four players along the way, and scored to give the Sting the 2-0 lead. At 32 minutes, Taylor Shore and Melissa Curran combined for a 1-2 to score the third and final goal for the team. Sunrise won the title by a 3-0 score.

For the Sting, this was their fourth tournament championship since April 2. The team previously won the championships at Nova (April 2), FAU (April 9) and Apopka (April 15). The team has a 16-0-1 mark during this tournament run and have extended their unbeaten streak to 20 games. Sunrise has a lifetime record of 39-5-5. Most important, all of the girls on the team have improved significantly and have been enjoying the entire experience. The entire team is returning for next season, but we only have eight on the team so we are looking to add a few new players. Click for tryout information.

HV stands for Hoover Junior High School. HV is located at 196 Washington Avenue, Indialantic, Fl 32903.
PB stands for Palm Bay Regional Park. PB is located at 1951 Malabar Road NW, Palm Bay, Fl 32907

Hotel:
Hilton Melbourne Rialto Place
200 Rialto Place
Melbourne, Florida 32901
321-768-0200

Directions to the Hotel from Sunrise:

OPTION 1 - PER THE HOTEL
1. I-95 North to Exit 180 (192) take a right (East)
2. Go about 5 miles to Airport Blvd and take a right
3. Go to the third traffic light and the hotel will be on the right aside (about 1.5 miles)

OPTION 2 - PER GOOGLE
1. Turnpike North (go 94 miles)
2. Take the SR-70 exit 152 to Fort Pierce/Vero Beach (go .5 miles)
3. Turn right at Okeechobee Road (go .7 miles)
4. Take I-95 North (go 44 miles)
5. Take SR-514 Exit 173 to Palm Bay/Malabar (go .5 miles)
6. Turn right on Malabar RD NE/Malabar RD SE (go .5 miles)
7. Turn left at Babcock St NE (go 3 miles)
8. Continue on to Babcock ST S (go 3.3 miles)
9. Turn left at Rialto Pl (go .3 miles)
TOTAL - 152 miles (about 2 hours 49 minutes)

Directions from the Hotel to Hoover Junior High School

1. Turn right at Babcock St S (go .3 miles)
2. Turn left at Hibiscus Blvd East (go .9 miles)
3. Turn right at S. Harbor City Blvd (go .4 miles)
4. Turn left at E. Strawbridge Ave (go .2 miles)
5. Continue on Melbourne Causeway (go 1.8 miles)
6. Turn left on N Ramona Avenue (go .4 miles)
7. Turn left at Watson Drive (go 102 feet)
8. Turn right at N Ramona Avenue (go .4 miles)
9. Turn right at Washington Avenue (go 52 feet)
TOTAL - 4.8 miles (about 10 minutes)

Directions from the Hotel to Palm Bay Regional Park:

1. Head NW from Rialto Place (go .1 miles)
2. Turn left at Airport Blvd (go .8 miles)
3. Turn right at New Haven Ave W (go 2.8 miles)
4. Turn left at Minton Road (go 3 miles)
5. Bear right at Minton Rd NE/Minton Rd NW (go 2.5 miles)
6. Turn right at Malabar Road SW/Malabar Road NW (go 3.6 miles)
TOTAL - 12.8 miles (about 23 minutes)