|
|
|
 |
| |
| May 27, 2005
By Jim Anderson
Regional Recap: Toronto
|  We traveled north of the border for our first Canadian Qualifier for the 2005 NARCh season, hosted by Rosemont Arena and York Region.
Squirt Division:
The 5 teams would play 2 games before moving on to the playoffs, with the top 3 advancing directly to the semifinals.
Mississauga Rattlers, #4, and Brampton Radicals, #5, would have a play in game to determine the final semifinalist. After trading late 1st period goals, the squads would remain tied at 1 until the Rattlers scored with just over 7 minutes to play in regulation, breaking the tie and advancing into the semis.
Top seeded York Mission Triumph ’92 was waiting for the Rattlers, and dispatched them easily in the round robin. Mississauga had learned some lessons for the initial meeting and trailed only 5-4 with 11 minutes to play before the 92’s added a pair of late goals to move into the Final with a 7-4 victory.
York’s 93’s would be trying to make it an all Triumph final as they faced the #3 Oakville Coyotes in the 2nd semifinal. Three times they took a one-goal lead, the last being at 3-2 with just over 13 minutes to play. Oakville regrouped and scored 4 unanswered goals to advance with a 6-3 win.
In the Championship, Oakville took a 2-0 lead with goals from Jacob Liptok and Tyler Shiplo before the Triumph answered back with James Ryan’s tally.
Oakville came right back with another pair though, this time by Dylan Cooper and Brandon Alderson, to stretch the lead to 4-1 after one period of play.
In the 2nd, Oakville would continue their offensive with Liptok’s 2nd and 3rd book ending Ricky Rota’s 1st of the contest.
York would answer back with a goal from David Freidmann to close within 7-2 but Oakville was too strong and closed out the eventual 9-3 win to take home the Squirt title.
York Mission Triumph ’92 swept the individual awards with James Ryan taking home High Scorer, 8 points, and Victor Adamo’s 0.950 Save Percentage besting all goalies in the division for Top Goaltender honors.
Pee Wee
After the round robin, we’d have 3 teams with identical win-loss-tie records and headed to the Tiebreaker to determine their seeds. York Mission Triumph AAA would finish #1, Thornhill Wild at #2 and Motor City Matrix #3.
This would again give us a #4 vs. #5 playoff between York Mission Triumph, AA this time, and Oakville Coyotes. Again, Oakville would prevail, protecting a one-goal lead for most of the way before adding an insurance goal for a 4-2 win.
The initial meeting between Triumph AAA and Oakville was a close 3-2 battle, this time the Triumph had learned their lessons. Jumping out to a 4-0 lead and 6-2 at the half, they eventually closed it out with a 10-2 victory to advance to the Final.
Thornhill jumped out to an early 2-0 lead against Motor City in the 2nd semifinal before the Matrix came back to tie it at 2 with 3:20 remaining in the first period. Thornhill would go up 3-2 with a minute to play in the period.
Motor City would regroup though and score 4 unanswered goals, from 4 different players, for a 6-3 win and a shot at the title.
Motor City struck first in the final before Blake Sexton tied it up for the Triumph just 34 seconds later only to see the Matrix take a 2-1 lead with 9:03 left in the first.
York tied it at 2 when Morgan Bonner scored and took the lead for good when Sexton added 3 more to close out the first half with a 5-2 lead.
In the 2nd half, Bonner completed his Hat Trick with a pair of goals, the only scoring we’d see in the half to close out the Final and help lead the Triumph AAA to the Pee Wee Championship.
Motor City Matrix player Christopher Moore led all skaters with 5 points in the round robin for High Scorer
Ryan Doggart, York Mission Triumph AAA, earned Top Goaltender status with a 0.850 Save Percentage, tops in the division.
Bantam/Midget
Hamilton Powerblades would just hold off the 1989 Oakville Coyotes, you may remember them from some WN 05 Bantam Gold and Pee Wee Gold ’04 Finals, for the top seed while the York 86’, 89 and A squads sorted out seeds 3-5.
York’s 89’s would dispatch there A squad in the playoff game with an 8-0 win to take the last semifinal slot and a meeting with Hamilton.
The 89’s had been defeated soundly in the round robin, 7-2, but turned the tables on the top seeded Powerblades with a 3-2 victory.
The 86’s would try and make it an all Triumph Final but fell short to the Coyotes, who advanced with a 4-1 victory.
It would take nearly 15 minutes before either team could break the ice, and Oakville’s Bradley Savelson opened the scoring. The Coyotes would hold onto the 1-0 lead through the first period of play.
Oakville made it 2-0 just 3 minutes into the 2nd period when David Master converted the Savelson feed.
York cut it to 2-1 at the 10-minute mark when Andrew Rhodes scored and tied it with just 3:25 to play on Chris Tanev’s unassisted goal.
The Coyotes had another run left in them and took the lead once again, this time with just 74 seconds to play in regulation, when Drew Scheistel broke the tie and once again put his squad on top.
With time winding down, York tied it up with just 21 seconds to play on Andy Grillo’s goal and tie the contest at 3.
We’d go through a 5 minute sudden death before moving on to a shootout. It seems that each week one of our divisions is being decided this way and it makes for some exciting finishes.
In the Shootout, Oakville was able to just hold off the Triumph and skate off with the Bantam/Midget championship.
Jacob Truant, 1989 Oakville Coyotes, took High Scorer with 6 points in the round robin to lead all players.
Nick Finneli, Hamilton Powerblades, led all goaltenders with a 0.893 Save Percentage for Top Goaltender accolades.
Junior/Senior
8 teams would vie for the title in this division, including the Fireants who came from Connecticut for a weekend of NARCh hockey north of the border.
York Mission Triumph Jr finished in the #1 seed, while the Hyper Caning Mudhogs, York Mission Triumph Sr and Kanata Kowboys rounded out our semifinalists.
Triumph Jr’s skated out to a quick 2-0 lead in their semifinal against Kanata, only to see the Kowboys close to 2-1 early in the 2nd period. York would keep its composure and add 3 more in the 2nd, including 2 just 35 seconds apart to move into the Final.
York’s Sr squad would now try to make it an All York Final one last time and they had a chance after taking the early 1-0 lead in the first period.
Hyper would answer back to make it 2-1 before York tied it again with 4:28 left in the 1st period, before the Mudhogs answered right back and held the 3-2 lead through the first 17 minutes of play.
The Mudhogs would add to the lead in the 2nd, stretching the lead to 6-2 before a late York goal gave us the 6-3 final.
Hyper continued their offensive ways in the Championship, with Brock Murray, Mike Read and Jon Pickering giving them a 3-0 lead just over 10 minutes into the Final.
Adriano Mauceri would trim the lead to 3-1 with a 1st period goal and keep the deficit manageable as the teams headed into the 2nd period.
In what was truly a game of 2 different halves, York came out with the ship righted to start the 2nd period.
Jon Gardiman and Tim Sedor scored early in the half to tie the Final a 3 and York took their first lead of the game when Mark Dowsett scored with 12:31 to play.
David Hammond would follow with a natural hat trick, giving York a 7-3 lead before Dowsett’s 2nd of the game gave us the 8-3 final.
York Mission Triumph Sr goaltender Tim Little’s 0.863 Save Percentage earned him Top Goaltender.
York Mission Triumph Jr player David Hammond led all skaters with 15 points in the round robin for High Scorer.
That wraps it up for our first event in Canada this year, with at least 2 more to come along with just south of the border in Buffalo, NY. This weekend we roll into the holiday weekend at Dumars and our annual UK Qualifier.
|
Site
Credits |
|
|
|
