The team from Bat Yam, Israel, the Division B champions of the 35th annual BSR International Peewee Hockey Tournament held in Lévis, pose with their trophy. At right is Jonathan Hawey,
who helped get Israel into the tournament for the first time. [Chantal Bourgault photo]
By JANICE ARNOLD, Staff Reporter (CJN)
An Israeli team, making its North American debut, became the upset champion in their division at an international peewee hockey tournament near Quebec City.
Bat Yam surprised even their most ardent supporters by winning the gold medal in Division B of the 35th annual BSR International Peewee Hockey Tournament held in suburban Lévis. They won all four
of their games in the division, which had 17 teams, mostly from Quebec.
The BSR is the little cousin of the Quebec International Peewee Hockey Tournament, now in its 51st year, which took place concurrently and includes 16 countries and over 2,000 players
In the final game Feb. 21, Bat Yam beat Edmundston, N.B., 8-7. Earlier that day, the Israelis, aged 9-12, won the semifinal game against the Brûleurs de Loups 1 from Grenoble, France 3-2 in
overtime.
Bat Yam, which is near Tel Aviv, stunned everyone with their 8-2 trouncing of the Husky 1 Chaudière-Ouest in their opener at the 10-day tournament, before going on to edge another Quebec team,
the Aigles CBIO of Beauport, 3-2.
?It's unbelievable,? said Jonathan Hawey, the Jewish Quebec City resident who was largely responsible for convincing the organizers to include Israel for the first time in the tournament, which
drew about 130 teams from seven other countries.
Hawey, who has been involved with hockey in Quebec all of his life and has helped develop the Israeli Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), placed the Bat Yam team in a lower-ranked division because he
thought they might not be ready to play with the better teams. In fact, he feared they might not even win one game in Division B.
They weren't eligible to compete for the tournament's top trophy, the Coupe du Monde de l'Amitié, but Hawey is already thinking that may change next year. He hopes Israel will become a regular
entrant in the tournament, alongside such powerhouses as Canada, the United States and Finland.
Bat Yam's captain, Mark Revniaga, scored the second-highest number of points in Division B with his 11 goals and five assists, while brothers Dan and Michael Boudnikov weren't far behind in,
respectively, the fourth and fifth spots.
Hawey thinks the team greatly benefited from their coach Dima Gromkov spending two months last summer in Quebec upgrading his skills, specifically with Lévis' Midget AAA team, Les Commandeurs,
something Hawey arranged.
For example, Hawey said the team showed impressive skill in killing off a penalty with just one minute and 48 seconds left in the third period of the 3-2 squeaker over Beauport.
Bat Yam has grown into an international-calibre team (it previously played in Latvia and France), despite having no arena in their town, a suburb of Tel Aviv. The players have to travel two hours
to Metullah on the northern border, site of Israel's sole regulation-size ice rink.
Before returning home to Israel from Montreal, the team was given a private tour of the Bell Centre, home of the Montreal Canadiens. They were greeted by former Habs head coach Jean Perron who
coached Israel's senior national team to an IIHF Division II championship in 2005 and continues to be an adviser to the IIHF.
Some of the players attended his hockey camp in Israel last summer.
Perron took the kids through the Canadiens' hallowed dressing room and took off his 1986 Stanley Cup ring to let them have a close look.
?I'm very, very proud of you,? Perron said to the players. ?Say hello to all of my hockey players in Israel.?
?This is a big shot in the arm for hockey in Israel,? said Montreal businessman Alan Maislin, past chair of the IIHF, who thinks the presence of the 21 Israeli youngsters, including two girls, in
Quebec had the added bonus of showing people a different side of the Jewish state.
Outside the tournament, Bat Yam was also invited to play several exhibition games in the Quebec City area.
Team manager Victor Gokhberg, whose son Maxim is the goaltender, admitted he never dreamed the team would do as well as it did.
He said between 200 and 300 Israeli children are now playing ice hockey at the peewee level. Because of the lack of ice rinks, hockey on inline skates is far more popular, with perhaps a couple
of thousand kids playing in total.
A second ice hockey arena is set to open in the southern resort of Eilat in the near future, Gokhberg said, but that's even further away from Bat Yam than Metullah.
Bat Yam's gold medal in Quebec should help generate more interest in the game among Israeli children. ?Soccer and basketball are the favourite sports. Hockey is still low on the list,? said
Gokhberg, a native of Latvia.
The kids seemed awestruck walking through the Bell Centre, with its photos of hockey legends and displays of game memorabilia. They looked down onto the 22,000-seat arena from the dizzying
heights of the press gallery and the VIP box.
Uri Benhar, 11, a left-winger who had three goals in the tournament, said he became interested in hockey while living for seven years in Raleigh, N.C., and his favourite team remains the Carolina
Hurricanes.
Asked what it meant to him to be in a hockey shrine like the Bell Centre, the shy Benhar said, ?It's exciting' It feels good.? He added that his ambition is to play in the NHL.
In the midst of all the celebration, Hawey noted that his fundraising to cover Bat Yam's costs here was not very successful. He raised about $6,000 and needs at least another $5,000 to pay the
bills. Funds are being collected through Quebec City's only synagogue, Congregation Beth Israel Ohev Shalom.
