The Jamaica Olympic Ice Hockey Federation (JOIHF) has secured a significant sponsorship deal from United States-based Geneva Financial Home Loans.
The sponsorship, though not yet quantified, is expected to be all-encompassing and go a long way towards helping the JOIHF’s goal of qualifying for the 2030 Olympics.
The short-term plan, according to president of JOIHF, Don Anderson, is to target at least three tournaments in 2022. Anderson says the association also intends to host a two-week camp in Kingston during the summer to help build the local component of the programme and recruit and develop local talent. The ultimate goal of the recruitment and development drive is the creation of a local league, one of the prerequisites for playing in Olympic qualifying events.
Summer programme
The plan is to commence with Roller Hockey in the summer programme and use this as a base to transition into playing on ice.
Geneva is a mortgage financial home loans company headquartered in Chandler, Arizona, with more than 130 branches across 46 states in the US.
In announcing the deal with JOIHF, Rachel Caple, Geneva Financial’s chief sales and revenue officer and wife of JOIHF board member Sean Caple, said, “My husband is a board member and the Director of Hockey Operations for JOIHF, which makes the success of the programme all the more personal. To have been able to watch this programme develop and grow has been rewarding and I can’t wait to see what they will accomplish long term.”
Geneva was the principal sponsor of the team that participated as an exhibition team in the October 2021 LATAM tournament in Fort Lauderdale. Jamaica had to play as an exhibition team, despite being the competition’s defending champions. The team was deemed too strong for the tournament, proving the theory by winning the six games it played, scoring 58 goals with only 7 against. On the way to that record, the Jamaicans beat Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Venezuela, Puerto Rico and Lebanon.
“Our company is built on the principle of humans supporting humans and this opportunity to stand behind a team that has accomplished so much in such a short time, and which is working towards the Winter Olympic Games of 2030, was not to be missed.”
