Power Soccer is an adaptive sport played by people with disabilities affecting their upper and lower bodies such as muscular dystrophy, spinal muscular atrophy, and cerebral palsy. It is one of only a few sports available to people with power chairs (with others like wheelchair rugby, wheelchair basketball, and wheelchair tennis requiring push wheelchairs).

We’ve been following this amazing sport for about four years mainly with the Northeast Passage Wildcats. Last summer marked the Wildcats’ first appearance at a national tournament with a third place finish in the 2016 Founder’s Cup. This year in the United States, Power Soccer teams are split into three tiers. The top tier is the Premier Conference followed by the Champions and the President’s conferences.

Today we flew from Boston, Massachusetts out to Indianapolis, Indiana for the United States Power Soccer MK Battery Conference Cup Series, the year-end national tournament for the three conferences. As it turns out we ended up hopping on a Southwest flight not only with the Wildcats but also with the Boston Brakers and two players from the Vermont Chargers (which means there were THIRTEEN wheelchair users taking one single flight). Needless to say it took some extra time getting all of the passengers situated although the Southwest crew did an amazing job making sure everyone made it on safely. Once aboard it was smooth sailing (or flying!) and we touched down in Indy just two hours later.

29 teams from the three conferences will be fighting for their respective championships over the next three days (June 16th to June 18th). The Wildcats and the Chargers are in the President’s Conference while the Brakers and the PRHC Chariots are in the Champions Conference (and will round out the competitors from our local New England states).

Looking ahead to the next few days we will see some thrilling competition from some of the best teams in the country. Last summer the Circle City Rollers edged out a surprise underdog, the Turnstone Furious Flyers in the Premier final. The DASA MO Rush and the PRHC Chariots won the Champions and Presidents Cups respectively while the Madison Marauders dominated the (now defunct) Founders Conference.

Here’s a clip of some of the exciting tournament action from last year.

You can catch all the action on the Power Soccer shop Livestream here. Matches will start bright and early with two Premier Conference matches (Vaqueros v. Turnstone Flyers and Magic v. Rollers). Make sure to follow along all day on the livestreams and on our social media pages. Then meet us back here same time tomorrow for a wrap-up of day 1 of the Power Soccer Conference Cup Series!