The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

18 stouffville suntribune thursday feb 8 2007 stouffville suntribune sports where dd she come from staff photosjoerd witteveen stouffville district secondary school spartan dayle wilkinson appears surprised by a check by markham district high school marauder iizz lennon during york region high school action at stouffville arena tuesday markham won 21 spartans rebound from winless year by mike hayakawa staff writer the only place the stouffville dis trict secondary school spartans senior boys basketball team could go this sea son was up after going winless last season in york region high school tier two play this years version of the spartans has done that and more despite an openinggame loss the spartans managed to finish the regular season above the 500 mark at 53 that tied the spartans with keswick high school for fourth place in the east divi sion keswick won out on the tiebreak er more important though the spar tans qualified for postseason play today at toronto district christian school at 515 pm things are definitely looking good its definitely a big turnaround from last year head coach jeff fongsaid the presence of ken czerwinski has been large a sixfoot threeinch centre czer winski attended stouffville in grade 9 before transferring to live with his father in lindsay for two years this high school sports year however he returned to stouffville to live with his mother and is enrolled for his grade 12 year hes our big guy in the middle who is a great rebounder and a strong fin isher hes quick and he works hard fong said theres good chemistry thats devel oped with his other starters that include cocaptains kyle law who plays point guard and small forward matt briggs rounding out the starting five are firstyear seniors forward adam prokop and guard brodie atkinson both grade 11 players these guys have been with me when i coached the junior team so they know the system i like to run said fong whose team won the york tier two junior title two years ago on offence theyre highly struc tured on defence they like to trap hockey boys open playoffs with onegame series today the stouffville spartans senior boys hockey team begins its second season today when it hosts st elizabeth catholic high school thornhill at the stouffville arena at 2 pm in a single- game elimination the spartans finished the regular season with a 521 mark good for sec ond in the york region athletic associ ations east division and fifth overall st elizabeth was last in the west divi sion with an 060 mark and 12th over all the division winners including brother andre catholic high school markham westmount collegiate institute thornhill and huron heights secondary school newmar ket and the next highest club cardinal carter catholic high school aurora received firstround byes the spartan girls continued regular season play with a 21 loss to markham tuesday at the stouffville arena for more on high school sports log on to yraacom by mike hayakawa staff writer the way stouffville spirit head coach dan west looks at the provincial junior a hockey league playoffs good teams will eventually face an opponent they havent seen during the regu lar season his spirit gets its feet wet with an unknown opponent in the east conferences cobourg cougars games 1 2 in stouffville the first game in the best- ofseven series goes tonight at 730 at the stouffville arena game 2 will also be played in stouffville sunday at 330 pm the series moves to cobourg monday and wednesday the cougars who the spirit played often in the 1990s finished the regular season in ninth place with a 152941 mark and are in the midst of a sevengame losing streak i dont think facing a team like the cougars whom we havent seen all year will hurt us west said itll be a new challenge for us and if we go on in the playoffs you will face teams you havent seen just like what we went through last year that would be his clubs run to the norfhwest con ference tide in which they defeated the west champion oakville blades west hopes his charges do not take cobourg too lightly the spirits advance scouting tells him the cougars have two good forwards in dennis zak who led the club in scor ing with 24 goals and 39 assists and linemate patrick jobb who was second as well he knows they have a solid netminder in dan clarke who had 14 wins theyll give us a good challenge theyre a physical club they work hard and playing in a smaller rink could help them it wont be easy but i think well be com fortable in playing them west said west says his club which finished the regular season in second place in the north conference with a 281632 mark is in relatively good shape with two solid netrnin- ders in trevor oneill and mark kubicz a veteran defence that has done a solid job in protecting its own end and four solid forward units west tfiinks his club should be ready since christmas weve lost just two games both to aurora north conference regular season champions but we feel confident and good about our chances he said will acton still out about the only concern west has entering the post season is the status of veteran forward will acton who is still recovering from a con cussion its highly unlikely the stouffville resident will see action in the first round the spirit concluded the regular season monday by battling the host vaughan vipers to a 33 overtime tie tyler gubb corey fulton and frank salituro scored in orangeville friday myles gomes scored the gamewinning marker and assisted on another in a 31 triumph midget callup daniel ciampini and rookie phenom corey trivino had the other spirit goals kubicz picked up the win in goal laraetei community looking to acknowledge a simple act of character xk nominate someone who has made a positive x difference for the 2007 visit wwwcharactercommunitycom