Western Canadian championships

August 19, 2008
The Vancouver Irish Sporting & Social Club, and its representative Men's & Ladies' Gaelic Football teams, created their own little piece of history by becoming the first club to secure the Western Canadian Championship double. Visiting the Calgary venue, the site of the Harps previous Men's Championship success (won in the year of the most balanced competitive circumstances in 2006), the Vancouver club made a strong statement in fielding not only their Championship sides, but a second Men's team also.  The Ladies championship was never going to be given up by the Harps, but the Calgary Chieftains girls certainly made them fight for their silverware.     And so it was, in both the Ladies and the Men's Championships, Vancouver Harps were victorious.  Congratulations to the Club in Vancouver for their development since 2003, a dire season, when the club failed to bring either team to any tournament. Fittingly enough, in their first season, the "Tom's" return to Vancouver, the home town of their namesakes, the Tom Butler Men's Trophy & the Tom Gibbons Ladies' Cup.  Calgary Tournament Results:   The Albertan clubs must have been scratching their heads about how they were going to beat the Harps in both Ladies and Men's.  Alas, in the Ladies Tournament, the Harps did prove unbeatable and Tara Philips collected her second tournament title of the season.   In the Men's however, Vancouver's dominance was emphatically ignored, and the Battle of Alberta between Edmonton & Calgary was the showcase game on Sunday.  The Chieftains, led on the field by Eamonn O'Keeffe and Michael O'Donnell, were not to be denied on their own patch.     Calgary Tournament Trophy (Men's) - Calgary Chieftains (defeating the Edmonton Wolfe Tones) Calgary Tournament Trophy (Ladies') - Vancouver Harps (defeating the Calgary Chieftains)

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