We're all set to ring in the new year, but before we leave 2015 behind let's have a look back at the biggest North Shore sports stories of the past 12 months.
We'll start right at the top with our No. 1 story, a teenaged swim sensation who in 2015 showed she can keep up with, and beat, the best in the world.
1. Hello, Emily Overholt
The year 2015 basically consisted of one strange low and many wild highs in the pool for West Vancouver's Emily Overholt. The teenager, who graduated from Collingwood School in June, was relatively unknown in the international swim world when she hit the pool for the 2015 Pan Am Games held in July. By the end of the competition, however, she was the talk of all of Toronto.
Overholt announced her presence with authority in her opening event, outracing all but Olympic champion Allison Schmitt of the United States in a world-class field to take silver in the 200-metre freestyle.
Overholt's breakthrough appeared to go into overdrive the following day when she out-touched Caitlin Leverenz of the United States at the wall to finish first in the 400-m individual medley. A few moments later, however, her joy turned to bitter disappointment in a scene that played out on live television. Overholt had just finished an interview with CBC's poolside reporter David Amber, receiving congratulations on her new Canadian and Pan Am Games records, when she was tapped on the shoulder, directing her attention to the scoreboard which now listed her not at the top as the gold medal winner but at the bottom, disqualified.
"Wait, what?" Overholt said, before being whisked away to learn more about her unfortunate fate. The verdict: a judge ruled that Overholt had performed a seldom-called illegal turn, using a "nonsimultaneous touch" during the breaststroke leg of the medley.
Overholt was crushed by the decision but showed great poise in diving back into the fray just a few minutes later to swim the opening leg of the 4x200-m freestyle relay, staking Canada to an early lead that was soon gobbled up by the United States and Brazil. Canada finished third, giving Overholt her second medal of the Games.
Overholt capped her wild week with another incredible swim, winning the 400-m freestyle final in thrilling fashion less than 24 hours after her disqualification. Racing out of lane eight after grabbing the last spot in the final during the qualification heats, Overholt clocked a Pan Am Games record time of 4:08.52, out-touching Venezuela's Andreina Pinto by a quarter of a second.
"Last night was heartbreaking, and I wanted to win so badly today to make up for it," Overholt said moments after the race. "I'm so happy right now."
And her breakout campaign wasn't quite finished yet. In August Overholt capped off an unbelievable summer of swimming with a bronze medal in her first-ever appearance at the FINA World Championships held in Kazan, Russia. Still just 17 years old at the time, Overholt clocked a Canadian record time of 4:32.52 in the 400-m individual medley to finish third behind Katinka Hosszu of Hungary and Maya DiRado of the United States.
The results were amazing, but what resonated for many observers was the way Overholt handled herself after the DQ, accepting the decision with grace while regrouping to help her team win a relay medal.
"That shows the character of the young lady, that she had that happen, dust yourself down and get back up for the relay, lead the relay off in the manner that she did," said Swimming Canada highperformance director John Atkinson in an interview during the Pan Am Games.
With a wild 2015 now in her wake, Overholt is racing into 2016 with confidence and credentials that will make her one of Canada's medal favourites at the Olympic Games in Rio.
2. Wolf Pack win first title
The North Van Wolf Pack junior B squad claimed the first PJHL title in team history in 2015, completing an impressive championship turnaround that began when the once-struggling franchise relocated from Squamish before the 2011-12 season.
The Pack have improved their win total in each season since making the move, and in 2015 they went right to the top, finishing first in regular season before beating the Mission City Outlaws four games to two to claim the championship trophy. Five-foot-seven fourthline rookie Ian Creamore broke a 2-2 tie against the Outlaws seven minutes into the third period of Game 6 of the finals with what turned into the championship-winning goal in a tense 3-2 win for the Pack. Major credit for the team's championship run went to the top line of Mitch Crisanti, Spencer Quon and Brodyn Nielsen. Crisanti set a blistering scoring pace, firing home 19 goals in just 15 games. His point total of 36 was tops in the playoffs, followed by Quon who racked up 32 points, including 25 assists, in 13 games. Nielsen, the team's captain, finished tied for third in scoring with 26 points in 15 games.
Credit also goes to the father and son duo of CEO Dean Samson and head coach/general manager Matt Samson who founded the team in Squamish and made the move to North Van, bringing junior hockey back to the North Shore with a franchise that appears built to last. In a strange twist Matt Samson left the team following the championship win to take a coaching job in the BCHL, but the Wolf Pack continues to prowl. Despite losing the top seven scorers from last year's championship team, North Van currently sits in first place in the PJHL with 45 points in 30 games played before the Christmas break.
3. Blues turn to gold
Things couldn't have started much worse for the Capilano University men's soccer team in the 2015 season. The Blues began their campaign with a record of 0-5-1 in September, planting themselves firmly at the bottom of the PacWest standings. The coaches and players, however, didn't panic. It was assistant coach Desmond Tachie who coined a phrase that summed up the situation. The Blues, Tachie told the team, were the best 0-5-1 squad he'd ever seen. And for the rest of the year, the team proved him right.
The Blues finished with a 9-1-1 record in October, completing their amazing turnaround with a 2-0 win over Kwantlen in the PacWest championship final on Halloween night.
"Crazy year," said Capilano head coach Paul Dailly after the PacWest final. "We just kept believing in each other, kept believing in the system, the guys we had in place. We got a couple of bounces here and there and that just seemed to steamroll things for us."
The Blues then capped their season by finishing second at the CCAA national championships held at Champlain College Saint-Lambert in Saint-Lambert, Que. The Blues appeared poised to take gold at nationals when their opponents, the Humber Hawks, lost two players to red cards in the first half but Capilano couldn't capitalize and ended up losing in a shootout following a 0-0 draw.
Sutherland grad Krisitan Yli-Hietanen was named an All-Canadian after winning the PacWest Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year awards.
4. Twins pull off a double play
The North Shore Twins have had a lot of success over the years, including three straight B.C. Premier Baseball League championships from 2007 to 2009, but in 2015 they hit heights they'd never reached before.
This summer the Twins won the regular season title in the highly competitive BCPBL for the first time in franchise history, racking up a 34-10 record to finish first in regular season play. They then followed through in the playoffs, winning the championship in emphatic fashion. The Twins outscored the rest of the elite teams in B.C. 69-19 while compiling a 5-1 playoff record, including an 18-7 win over the Nanaimo Pirates in the provincial final.
In August the Twins came one win away from topping their dream season with a national title, claiming silver at the Baseball Canada 18U National Championships. It was their first time ever attending the national tournament, which is not affiliated with the BCPBL.
The national silver was an impressive feat considering that none of the team's four starting pitchers who had dominated all season were available for the tournament. Braeden Toikka was too old for the 18-andunder format, Robert Hemer was nursing an injury, and Will McAffer and Matteo Vincelli were both away on duty with the Canadian Junior National Team.
Despite the loss in the last game of the year, 2015 was the best-ever season for the Twins, according to longtime general manager Rick Elstone.
"They were the best team I've seen and I've been around the Twins for about 15 years," he said. "That performance (at the BCPBL championships) with the offensive explosion, nobody has ever seen that. We just annihilated the rest of the guys. That's pretty hard to do.. .. It was quite a year, quite a team."
5. Sam scores gold
West Vancouver's Sam Reinhart didn't wait long to make his mark in 2015 as he rang in the new year by helping Canada win gold at the World Junior Hockey Championships in early January. Reinhart scored the game-winning goal as Canada topped Russia 5-4 in a thrilling championship final held at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto. His deft second period tip-in of a Max Domi shot gave Canada a 5-1 lead in the final and stood up as the winner after Russia mounted a rapid-fire comeback.
At the championships Reinhart scored five goals and notched 11 points to tie for the tournament lead in each category while registering a tournament-best plus-13 rating.
Following the tournament Reinhart was chosen by the coaches as one of Canada's topthree players and also selected by the media as a tournament all-star.
The win may have given Sam bragging rights in the talented Reinhart family. Sam's older brothers Max and Griffin have played in the NHL and represented Canada internationally, as has their father, Paul, who won two world championship bronze medals in the 1980s. This win, however, might be the biggest in the Reinhart family so far, Paul admitted after watching Sam win gold.
"I think that this is the most high-profile one," he said. "Whenever you're putting the Canadian jersey on you recognize that it's a special moment.. .. There's a different vibe and a different element of success involved in it. Combined with the Canadian flag, it's obviously something that every player is proud of."
Sam, who turned 20 in November, is now a fixture with the Buffalo Sabres, scoring 15 points in 35 games so far in the 2015-16 season, including three game-winning goals.
Bonus big-time performance
The Carson Graham senior football team got a huge performance from quarterback Tyler Nylander who rushed 26 times for an incredible 368 yards and seven touchdowns as the Eagles beat the Abbotsford Panthers 53-34 to win the AA provincial championship at BC Place Dec. 5. The yards and touchdowns are both believed to be record totals for B.C. High School Football championship finals.
Honourable mentions:
- Handsworth wins senior girls AAAA volleyball title;
- Derek Mayson wins Pan Am and World Championship gold as a member of Canada's national softball team;
- 2010 Olympic champion Maëlle Ricker retires from competitive snowboarding.
