31st Bill Eisenwinter Hot Shot Tournament: Good news — but first, a tourney

By MARK NELKE

Sports editor

On the eve of the Bill Eisenwinter Hot Shot Tournament, hosted by the Coeur d’Alene-based Timbers-Thorns North FC, club president Heidi Jump had some long-awaited news to share.

The Timbers-Thorns club recently completed purchase of 9.5 acres of land, including an indoor training facility and an office on the southwest corner of Prairie and Huetter.

On the land, the club plans to build three artificial turf soccer fields. The club was already using the 15,000-square-foot indoor facility and the office — a converted house.

Now, it can begin construction of the three outdoor fields.

“It’s very exciting that we can now move on to Phase 4; now we can begin developing the fields,” Jump said earlier this week.

The club is planning a big fundraising event for September. Each field will cost roughly $1 million to build, she said.

This week, however, the focus is on the 31st edition of the Hot Shot tournament, which begins with games today at 5 p.m., and runs through Sunday afternoon.

This year’s tournament, for boys and girls teams from the U8 through U19 divisions, has 201 teams entered. A total of 351 matches are scheduled over the three days, on as many as nine sites in Coeur d’Alene, Hayden, Post Falls and Rathdrum.

Last year’s tourney attracted 164 teams; the event was canceled in 2020 due to COVID-19. The 2019 tourney had roughly 150 teams, Jump said.

“I think teams are excited to get out on the pitch because of COVID,” she said. “Also … I think some clubs have been impacted more by COVID than other clubs … maybe the league options are a little less, so when an event presents itself closer to your area, I think a lot of teams are excited to find something that’s close.”

As well as the usual complement of North Idaho teams, teams are entered from Montana, Boise, Spokane and the Tri-Cities.

“And I’ve even turned away teams,” Jump said.

That’s because there’s only so many available fields in the area to get all the games in from late Friday afternoon to late Sunday afternoon.

Among the usual venues being used are the Coeur d’Alene Soccer Complex at Skyway Elementary, the Canfield Sports Complex, Woodland Middle School, The Fields at Real Life Ministries in Post Falls, Borah Elementary, Hayden Meadows Elementary, and fields at Coeur d’Alene and Lake City high schools.

This year, the club received permission to use the two Rotary Fields next to Lakeland Junior High.

For years, the Timbers-Thorns (formerly the Coeur d’Alene Sting) used eight fields at Hayden Meadows. But the Coeur d’Alene School District sold much of that land a couple years ago, leaving just two fields at the school.

However, since the rest of the land has yet to be developed, the club received permission to use it for matches and training — until work begins on turning the land into housing.

“We’re really grateful to them (Kulka Land/Ryne C. Stoker Separate Property Trust, owners of the land) … that provides us with six fields for the younger age groups,” Jump said. “I don’t know where we would have put them (if we didn’t have those fields).

“That brings back four 9v9 (nine players on each team) fields and two 7v7 fields,” said Jump, a board member for a decade, the tournament director in 2019 and ’21, and in her first year of a two-year term as club president. “Within the school property we have two 7v7 fields. I reached out to the owners and they have been so wonderful to work with, and so generous. It was like the best day of my life.”

Lights are available on six of the fields — three at Skyway, two at Real Life and the Lake City High football field — so games can be played there after sunset.

Back to the recent purchase of the land.

Jump and the other fundraising committee members — Melissa Quinn, Ty Kovatch, Katie Doree, Mike Thompson and Matt Ruchti — worked with Ryan Nipp of Parkwood Business Properties on the acquisition of the land.

With three new fields, more Timbers-Thorns teams can train on their own property, and be less reliant of the availability of other fields in the area.

The only other turf fields in the immediate area are the two at Real Life.

Also, the fields could be available to other groups in the area — when the air quality was bad, local high school teams as well as Gonzaga University trained in the indoor facility.

And with the higher level of play certain Timbers-Thorns teams are striving for, Jump said it’s important for the players to be able to train year-round, to keep up.

Jump said the club is thankful for their major sponsors — The Coeur d’Alene Tribe, Pizza Hut, the late Irma Anderl, Numerica among them.

She said there will be plenty of sponsorship possibilities at the new site — a chance to sponsor a field, a scoreboard, soccer goals and team benches, as well as donating services to help with building the fields.

“For me, this is exciting; this is something we’ve been working for for quite a few years (over five years),” Jump said. “I think it’s going to bring a lot of opportunities to our community. Primarily it will be used for our soccer club, but other sporting events and teams could use it. Everything’s a year or two behind because of COVID, so it’s nice to be where we are today.”

Tournament and club information: timbersthornsnorthfc.com