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Soccer Tournament Promotes A Drug-Free Holiday For Teens
By Lauren Puglisi
 | | --Photo By Lauren Puglisi Players from the Twin County Soccer Team sat together in the bleachers, watching their upcoming opponents before playing their next game. |
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Most schools closed for the holiday break, which means that concerned parents thought their teens would find themselves with too much extra time on their hands.
With the hopes of curbing this problem, the Jackson Municipal Alliance and Jackson PBA sponsored an indoor soccer tournament to promote a healthy, safe and fun event for local families.
"We wanted this tournament to take place when these kids had time off from school so that we could show them that it is possible to have a good time without experimenting with alcohol or drugs," Officer John Pejoski said.
During the two-day long tournament, the gymnasium at McAuliffe Middle School was filled with boys, girls and mens' teams of all ages. Each team was given complimentary holiday tournament t-shirts as well as the opportunity to participate in raffles towards winning different prizes.
Pejoski said the original plan for the tournament was to have a world cup game type of set-up.
"We decided to just let everyone play, rather than following a strict game schedule. I'm sure that things will work out, with Thursday being for the initial games while Friday will be devoted to the play-offs," Pejoski said. "Since the tournament may go all day, we were lucky enough to receive $700 worth of food donations from eateries in the area so that we could offer breakfast, lunch and dinner to all participants and their families."
Teens from Jackson, New Egypt, Brick and Point Boro played games against the alumni, men's, and police teams to fight for their chance at being the tournament's ultimate victors.
In between games, teammates ate and talked with friends, while some practiced throughout the hallways of McAuliffe.
Robert Brown, Chris Bette and Tom Carroll of New Egypt all said that they were having a great time as they passed a soccer ball to each other, showing team spirit before starting their next intense game.
"I think that we had a really great turnout for the event. Everything so far has been clean, thankfully no one has gotten hurt and everyone is having a good time," Pejoski said. "It was really helpful that so many different people came together to volunteer refereeing and coaching teams from all over the area."
The sponsors this year hope that the success of the indoor holiday tournament will allow for them to have a three day long event of the same nature for the following years to come.
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