Street Soccer Bowl still growing
Jun. 18—The Owensboro Street Soccer Bowl continues getting bigger and better.
For the fourth straight year, teams, spectators and vendors have surrounded the court at Legion Park this week to watch the tournament, which is set to conclude Sunday. Even storms earlier Friday couldn't deter the event, which features middle school, high school and adult open divisions playing in the afternoons and into the evenings.
"It's just fun," said Nikos Agisilaou, who created the event with his brother, Christakis. Both were soccer standouts at Owensboro High School and Kentucky Wesleyan College. "At the end of the day, we look back to when we were playing and we would've loved having a tournament like this. I know the kids love it.
"If we're not reffing, playing or coaching, then we're probably helping out with the scoreboard."
In fact, both brothers were involved with a middle school division game Friday, with Nikos coaching one squad and Christakis refereeing.
Despite spending almost a full week at the park, neither one showed signs of fatigue — especially since they see the impact that they're creating within the local soccer community.
"When me and my brother had the vision and the dream, this is what we always envisioned," Christakis said. "To see it happen within four years is just mind-blowing. Our first year, we had 15 teams and we didn't know what to expect. We didn't know how many people would come out and watch. We didn't know if kids would enjoy it.
"Here we are, four years later, and we've got 37 teams. We even had to turn some teams down due to the fact that we only have one court."
The tournament even added silver divisions, similar to a junior varsity level, for the high school and middle school competitions this year.
Every so often, Nikos said, he tries to look around and appreciate what he's helped build. Teams from five different cities are represented in this year's event, which brought out a number of fans in folding chairs and even pop-up tents to enjoy the outing
"I just love to enjoy the fun games out here," he said. "I'm reffing, but I love the passion from the kids. I love how they care, every play is crucial for them — I love that."
And, Nikos added, it keeps growing.
"We've gotten a lot of sponsorships and there are a lot of local people who love this," he said. "In general, the Owensboro soccer community is growing. Back in the early 2000s, you said futsal and everybody was like 'The heck are you talking about?' This is a little bit different, but it's just slowly growing."
Nikos was a key figure in the street soccer court's construction in 2017, and he believes Owensboro is ready for additional courts in the near future.
"Obviously, we're very limited with one court," he said. "We're at capacity, and we can't add any more teams. If we added another court, it wouldn't just allow us to more teams to come in, it would give a different atmosphere with two games going on at once.
"Hopefully we can get another court going at some point. We don't know when that'll be, but that's going to fix a lot of problems that we have and maybe minimize the length of the tournament. It's long, but it's fun."
Sometimes, Christakis added, even he can't believe how much the Street Soccer Bowl has grown in popularity.
"It feels like we just built this thing yesterday," he said. "I'm just super excited and grateful, and I just love watching these kids out here playing. It's been a lot of fun, so let's just keep it going."
