Women’s hockey flourishing in Sioux Lookout 

Tim Brody - Editor

The Sioux Snipers Women's Hockey League hosted their 14th Annual Women's Hockey Tournament at the Sioux Lookout Memorial Arena this past weekend.

The Dryden Inferno and the Kenora Blades journeyed to Sioux Lookout to compete in the tournament, where Sioux Lookout was represented by four teams.

The Sioux Snipers White team lost to Dryden in the tournament’s semi-finals.

The Sioux Warriors (made up of Sioux Lookout women, not the high school hockey team) advanced to the final by defeating the Kenora Blades in a game that went in to overtime, and was finally decided in a shootout.

The Dryden Inferno won the tournament, beating the Sioux Warriors 4-0.

Dryden captain Brett Lobreau commented, “It’s nice to see a bunch of ladies in northwestern Ontario hold a tournament that has such high caliber hockey… it was a lot of fun. We come back every year.”

Sioux Snipers player Diane Martin said of participating in the tournament this year, “Always a great time. My team played six games losing, in the semi-finals to Dryden. They did a great job organizing the tournament, with a beer gardens at the arena and the social Saturday night.”

Sam Carson, Sioux Snipers President and tournament coordinator said the tournament went very well.

Michelle Diston, another Sioux Snipers player, shared, “I am still beaming from how great this weekend was. It is my third year playing woman’s hockey. Natalie (Popovic, Diston’s sister) and I started at the same time. We have really improved in these short three years. We were so excited to see that we were both on the power play line up for our team. We were on Snipers Dark.”

Diston was able to play against her daughter Haylei in the tournament as well.

“It was a tense game playing against Haylei’s team. She was playing on the Sioux Warriors team. I learned all my hockey from watching her play. It was so much fun getting to play against her. It felt great when I could beat her to a play or get the puck away from her.”

Diston added, “As for the social, I organized it this year. The theme was Mad For Plaid. Everyone rocked the theme. It was a great turnout. The dance floor was packed. The music was fun and Volt Entertainment has a great light show with pyrotechnics.”

Carson said this year marks the 15th year since the start of the Women's Hockey League in Sioux Lookout, which was started by Tara Pettit.

Diston further informed, “Patty Everson had such a great email to the Snipers members recapping how far we have come in the 15 years of Sioux Snipers. She talked about how we finally have teams that can competitively play these tournaments. All the games were pretty close and we should be proud.”

“We’ve had almost 60 people register this year for our league, that’s probably one of our highest numbers we’ve had,” Carson added.

Sioux Snipers Women's Hockey League players hold weekly practices, play weekly games, and attend tournaments throughout the region.