January 20, 2012
Posted in Alberta Edition, Minor
By Laurence Heinen /
The Edge Midget AA Gold Mountaineers skated to six straight wins over three days from Jan. 6 to 8 to win the Piper Classic Tournament of Champions in Winnipeg.
“The guys just showed a lot of character,” said Edge Gold coach Ross McCain. “We scraped a few out, but at the end the tournament the guys managed to find a way to be on the positive side of the scoreboard each night.”
The Mountaineers beat the host John Taylor Pipers 4-3 on the opening morning of the tournament before edging past Dryden High School 2-1 later that same afternoon.
“We had a couple really tight games early in the tournament,” McCain said. “They kind of helped us build the momentum.”
The next day, the Edge squad beat Sturgeon Heights High School 4-1 and the Fort Frances Muskies 5-1 to finish the preliminary round with a perfect 4-0 record.
In semifinal action on Jan. 8, the Mountaineers edged the Kelvin Clippers 4-3 before earning a hard-fought 2-1 overtime win over the St. Paul’s Crusaders in the tournament final.
“The semifinal was another tight, character win which saw us get up a bunch of goals early,” McCain said. “Our last game, we came from behind in the third period. Down 1-0 going into the third and we managed a way to scrape out a victory in overtime.”
Gord Walters scored twice in the semifinal win over the Clippers. Taysen Holt and William Nicholas also scored, while Kyler Magus chipped in with two assists. Edge goalie Ravi Dattani made 35 saves to record the win.
The Mountaineers trailed 1-0 in the final against the Crusaders until Magus scored to tie up the contest at 4:22 of the third period.
“He kind of just came off the boards and let a good shot go,” McCain recalled. “It might have hit something in front, but it beat the goalie up high on the glove side. That was huge. Magus has been unbelievable this year at scoring those timely goals.”
Danton Oliver then emerged as the hero at 5:26 of overtime when he scored to give the Mountaineers the tournament title.
“He came up around the top of the circle on his off wing and just snapped it low by the goalie’s blocker,” said McCain, who commended Holt and Magus for setting up the play even though they didn’t get credited with assists on the scoresheet.
Edge netminder Jesse Shenton stopped 26-of-27 shots he faced to backstop the Mountaineers to victory.
“He had a couple breakaways he had to stop,” McCain said. “Man, he was on his head. He had a breakaway on him with 33 seconds left (in regulation) that he stopped. He stopped a rebound and he made another big save on kind of a weird play in overtime. He was named the goaltender of the tournament and he definitely deserved it.”
The Gold Mountaineers returned home for a pair of games against Northern Alberta Midget AA Hockey League foes. After beating the SHC Mustangs from Morinville 2-0 on Jan. 14, the Mountaineers suffered a 5-3 loss to the St. Albert Crusaders the next night.
As of Jan. 17, the Gold Mountaineers sat in first spot in the Varsity Division of the Canadian Sport and School Hockey League with a 13-3-1 record.
“We’ve got a few more games played than the teams chasing us,” McCain said.
The Gold Mountaineers have seven games left on their CSSHL regular-season schedule including back-to-back tests against the Edge Midget AA Maroon Mountaineers on Feb. 1 and 8.
“That’s going to be the focus down the stretch is preparing properly for those games and trying to execute as well as we can,” McCain said.
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