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Lauwereys said players from Sweden, Switzerland, Slovenia, Russia, Italy and elsewhere arrived by the busload — most unable to communicate in English but all of them keen on stocking up on equipment and souvenirs. “They all loved it, they thought everything in Windsor was great,” she said.

Last week’s international recreational hockey extravaganza was, by many participants’ accounts, “amazing.”

And the proud local hosts are convinced it’s another feather in the cap for the Windsor brand in the sports tourism world. But just how financially well the city did is still being calculated.

When it comes to the organizers’ estimate of a $15-million economic impact to the host city, “we don’t just throw a number out there,” said CARHA organizer Reuben Greenspoon. Over the next month or so, he said number crunchers will be gathering stats and “plugging hard numbers” into a formula to calculate just how big a financial bonanza the event was for its host city.

Photo by Tyler Brownbridge / Windsor Star

In 2013, when Windsor city council agreed to contribute $750,000 towards the event, there were those — including then-mayor Eddie Francis — who questioned CARHA’s estimate of a $15-million economic boon to the city. Three years later, at the conclusion of the tournament that attracted 2,300 participants in 134 teams from 14 countries, Greenspoon said he expects the final tally will confirm that figure.

“They’re usually pretty close,” he said of the STEAM (Sport Tourism Economic Assessment Model) estimates of the Canadian Sport Tourism Alliance used to calculate the economic benefits of such events.