Nov 07, 2023 | Troy Vanderburg | 827 views
Haldimand River Kings are U10A Silver Stick Champions!!!!
The Haldimand U10A River Kings are Silver Stick Champions!! On November 3rd the U10 River Kings travelled to Owen Sound to compete in the South Western Regional Championships. This would be a good test for our boys as the top teams from the region would be competing for the chance to represent in the International Silver Stick Tournament in January.
Their first game was against the TNT Tornados from the New Tecumseth area. The boys were ready for this one with some strong forechecking and good goaltending we came out with a convincing win. That would be the only game the Kings would play on Friday but had two tough games on Saturday.
Game one on Saturday was against the Collingwood Blues. The Kings got into penalty trouble in the first period going down 2-0 with the Blues scoring two powerplay goals. The boys picked up their game in the second scoring midway through the period to make it 2-1 then scoring a late shorthanded goal to tie the game at 2-2. With the pressure on the Kings were able to add two more in the third to win a hard fought game by a score of 4-2.
The late Saturday game was against Center Wellington Fusion. Haldimand came out ready to play scoring the only goal of the first period to take the lead 1-0. The second period was back and forth with both goalies standing on their heads not allowing anything by them. The score remained 1-0 after two. The third period the Kings started to take their foot off the petal and the Fusion took advantage scoring two quick goals in the first 5 minutes of the period. The Kings fought back hard but could not solve the Fusion goalie loosing by a score of 2-1.,
With three teams in our pool being 2-1 the River Kings came out of their pool in first place with the tie breaker. It was now off to the Sunday morning Semi Finals
Early Sunday we would meet the Orillia Terriers. The boys were still mad with loosing the night before and weren't going to let this happen again. Orillia was able to score the first goal but Haldimand was able to reply 23 seconds later and with a late period goal we were in the lead 2-1 after one. The boys got a quick goal in the second to go up 3-1 but the Terriers scored with 12 seconds left in the period to bring the score to 3-2. With the third period approaching the guys knew their tournament lives were on the line and popped in two goals in the first 3 minutes of the third to go up 5-2. The Kings went into their defensive mode and held the Terriers at bay with the final score being 5-2.
On to the Championship game against the St Thomas Stars. This game was under the bright lights as Rogers was there broadcasting the game and the Kings were not going to disappoint. The first period was back and forth with both teams feeling out each other. In the second period the Kings were on the board first scoring a shorthanded goal to take the lead 1-0 after two. On to the third and the Kings knew they needed to dig deep to pull off this win and they did just that. They were able to score two quick goals in the first 4 minutes and then they went again into their defensive mode. They were able to shut down any chance St Tomas had for the rest of the game to take the championship 3-0!!
The River Kings will now play January 11th-14th in the International Tournament in Newmarket where all the regional tournament champions will compete.