North Andover Hosts AYF-YOARF 2015 National Athletic Tournament

By Hrag Arakelian

NORTH ANDOVER, Mass.—This year’s AYF National Athletic Tournament (NAT) was hosted by the North Andover “Sassoun” AYF Chapter from March 6-8. It was a weekend of fellowship, entertainment, and friendly competition between Senior members of the AYF’s Eastern and Western regions. The weekend kicked off on Friday at the Character’s Sports Bar and Club as members started arriving from all over the East Coast. Friday night was teeming with excitement as distant friends and organization members were reunited once again.

The basketball and volleyball tournaments, held on Saturday at Lawrence High School in Lawrence, Mass., were a true testament to the skills and teamwork possessed by each chapter. In total, there were 11 men’s and 6 women’s basketball teams along with 6 co-ed volleyball teams.

The men’s teams representing their chapters were Boston (A&B), Providence, New Jersey (A&B), Philadelphia, Detroit, Worcester, San Fernando, New York, and the combined team of North Andover, Granite City, and Chicago. The women’s teams were Providence, Boston (A&B), Detroit, New Jersey, and Worcester. With nearly 150 athletes split into 23 teams, the competition waged for nearly 10 hours.

There was more to this basketball and volleyball tournament than rosters full of names people can’t ever seem to

pronounce correctly. This was organized by the AYF, which meant that not only was it a social atmosphere around an athletic event, but a cultural, Hai Tahd, and educational one as well. Just before the field house entrance was the school’s library, which coincidentally featured a special display of Armenian Genocide novels and literature. Walking into the field house, you would immediately step into a Hai Tahd frenzy as a crowd of AYFers took pictures of themselves holding up #TurkeyFailed signs, referring to Turkey’s failed attempt at annihilating the Armenian race, for we wouldn’t all be at NATs if they had succeeded.

Adding to the lively audience were musicians Shant and Raffi Massoyan of New Jersey, whose davul and zurna put a cultural swing on the music normally heard at sporting events.

Results

Women’s Basketball: New Jersey beat the Boston B team with a final score of 41-16.

Men’s Basketball: Boson’s A team beat the Western Region’s San Fernando chapter with a score of 47-33.

Volleyball (intermural): New Jersey beat Providence in a best out of 3 matches by winning the first 2 games.

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If competing all day long wasn’t hard enough for these athletes, the evening’s challenge was to get ready for the dance in less than two hours. The Andover Wyndham Hotel featured Kevork Artinian, Jim Kzirian, George Tebrejian, and Mal Barsamian who played modern and traditional Armenian dance music. The weekend owed its success to the hosting North Andover “Sassoun” AYF chapter and community.