Doing it right

First Sam’s Jam ball hockey tournament sets high standard for future events

By Craig Westcott / July 14, 2023

Organizers of the first ever Sam’s Jam Memorial Ball Hockey Tournament say they could feel the namesake’s presence throughout the games played last weekend and got confirmation of it when the rain broke though the heat during the very last game on Saturday.

The two-day tourney, which attracted some 85 ball hockey teams from throughout eastern Newfoundland, was staged by Sammy’s Climb Higher Foundation, a charity established to help children afford to play in sports, in memory of six-year-old Sammy Porter of CBS, who drowned last summer.

The tournament saw two days of sunny, muggy weather as hundreds of children stickhandled and slapped their way through game after game on the parking lot of Sammy’s school, Admiral’s Academy in Kelligrews.

“It was the perfect weather,” agreed Paul Connors, Sammy’s uncle and one of the organizers, who was alert throughout the weekend for some sign the young sportsman was watching.

“I said if it rained or if there is a shower on Saturday, it’s a sign that Sammy did that,” Connors had predicted. “They’ll all know that Sammy caused that shower of rain. And when the final game was played on Saturday it showered for a couple of minutes and it showered pretty heavy, just for that little while and then the sun came back out again.”

The event itself, which was an enormous success, involved a tremendous amount of preparation and work, much of it organized by Sammy’s mom, Angie Porter.

Teams travelled from Clarenville, Whitbourne, Bell Island, the Southern Shore, Placentia, Conception Bay North and St. John’s to participate. Most of the teams were from CBS, many composed of children who once played with Sammy.

The Foundation’s members weren’t surprised that so many showed up.

“It was a great event,” said Connors. “We were getting good feedback as we were organizing it and teams that play in other street hockey tournaments started reaching out to us wanting to find out when the registration would open and when the event was going ahead. So, we were quite pleased with the response, and overwhelmed probably, because it was such a large group for the first year. But we had lots of community interest, especially from Conception Bay South, as the word started to spread. We had over 150 volunteers there and people had their assignments and took them and did it without a hitch. For a first-time event it ran very smoothly. There were a couple of small hiccups, but nothing major.”

The volunteers even erected the yards and yards of metal fencing that sat over each of the playing surfaces. “We had a local construction company that assisted us with moving it and bringing it in, but then it was all volunteers who set up the 12 rinks,” Connors said. “All the referees were volunteers, all the scorekeepers were volunteers, all the 50/50 ticket sellers were volunteers. Everything was done on a volunteer basis.”

Connors said the community’s support for Angie, Steve and Sammy’s brother Aiden has been unbelievable since the tragedy happened. “These types of events help Angie and Steve and the family cope with this,” Connors said. “They see the outpouring of community support to keep Sammy’s memory alive. It’s so gratifying and so heartwarming that it’s hard to put into words.”

In addition to the “rinks,” the parking lot and grounds were dotted with booths featuring everything from food vendors to games. “It was really a family event,” Connors said. “I saw people out to support it whom I hadn’t seen in years and who didn’t even have kids there playing. They were just out to support it.”

The organizers are still tallying the proceeds.

“With the community support and the corporate donations that we received, running those numbers through my head, it’s going to be very successful for the foundation,” Connors allowed. “The foundation is going to be able to help a lot of children and people who are registering for various sports and helping with equipment for various sports and different things throughout the community.”

Connors said the foundation picked a date that was close to the anniversary of Sammy’s passing on July 17 and the Town of Conception Bay South wanted it to be part of the annual Kelligrews Soiree summer festival. “And as much as it was a completely volunteer-organized event, the Town was there to support us and help us out as much as they could,” he said.

The foundation hopes to make the street hockey jam an annual event.

“The response that we got from all the teams and the feedback that we got was, ‘We can’t wait ’til next year,'” Connors said. “As a matter of fact, some players asked me if we were going to have another one this year. So, the plan is to do an annual event and we will get the event off the ground again next year.”

There were so many different age and gender divisions, Sunday saw 17 championship games played. That made for 34 teams in the final matches. The same number Sammy wore on his hockey jersey.

Though there is pressure to grow the tournament even larger, Connors said the intention is to keep it at Admiral’s Academy.

“We anticipate getting requests from more teams next year, but we’re going to manage the growth,” he said. “We’re going to make sure that we put off a good event. We’re not looking for the largest event, we’re looking for a quality event and a well-organized event. So, we’re going to manage that growth as we go forward. We’re not just going to add teams for the sake of adding teams.”

This first tournament, meanwhile, set a high standard.

“We never got any negative feedback that I can think of right now,” said Connors. “It was all positive feedback. People talked about how well it was running, how much fun it was for all the kids. There was an opportunity for the kids, between games, to play (at other activities). It was all positive feedback that we received. Angie put a lot of time into making sure this was done right, and it was done right.”