TEAMS : Pee Wee AAA : Game Reports

<- - Pee Wee AAA TEAM

East Kings Pee Wee AAA Winterhawks Win Gold in Charlottetown's famous Spud Hockey Tourney! Click to enlarge On Sunday, February 1st 2004, the East Kings Pee Wee AAA Winterhawks defeated the powerful Dieppe Voyagers 3 to 2 to win the Gold Medal at the 29th Annual Clarica Spud Minor Hockey Tournament in Charlottetown, PEI. This is the first time a team representing the Eastern Valley communities of Centreville, Sheffield Mills, Canning, Kentville, Port Williams, Wolfville, Falmouth, Windsor and Mount Uniacke has won the Pee Wee AAA Division at "the SPUD". Sixteen teams from New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia registered for the Pee Wee AAA division of the tournament. In total, there were eight different divisions boasting 95 teams. The Spud is one of Eastern Canada's largest tournaments. The Winterhawks met Summerside in Game One of the Round Robin which was played in the beautiful new "big mac" Arena on the UPEI campus on Friday afternoon. With a four-goal performance from Reggie Rand, the Winterhawks won the game 9 to 0. Travis Hall recorded the shutout and all three lines scored. In Game Two, the Winterhawks defeated West Prince 7 to 0 at the Simmons Arena on Friday evening. Trevor Samson earned the shutout and again all three lines dominated the play. Chris Draper, Logan Phillips and Stephen Walker all notched two points in the game and the boys celebrated back at the hotel with a swim and pizza party. The final game in the Round Robin was played at Charlottetown's Civic Arena on Saturday afternoon. The Winterhawks were up against the strong Truro Bearcats, a team that has frustrated the Winterhawks all season long including the 4-3 overtime loss in the finals at Truro's Christmas tournament. The first period was a physical battle that ended tied 2-2. Scott Duncan opened up the scoring in the second with a huge slap shot from the left point that beat the Truro net minder cleanly. Early in the third period, the Bearcats opened up a two-goal lead. With time running down late in the third period, Coach Rand put Chris Draper, Reggie Rand and Xavier Foley out and they responded with a quick goal to bring the Winterhawks within one goal. With less than a minute to play in the game, the Winterhawks pulled their goalie, threw on the extra attacker and took the play down to Truro's end of the rink. Foley dug the puck out down low in the corner, fed a quick pass to Draper who relayed it to Reggie Rand who put it in the net with 3 seconds left to play to tie the game at 5 to 5. Coach Rand described the tie with Truro as "the TSN turning point of the tournament for the Winterhawks". On Saturday night, the Winterhawks met Cape Breton Co. in the Quarter Final game. Isaac Ueffing opened up the scoring in the first period with what many in the arena described as "the prettiest goal" of the tournament. Isaac picked the puck up behind his own net, wheeled through the neutral zone and let go a slap shot from the Cape Breton blue line that hit the top shelf. Walker, Rand and Phillips added three more goals during the second and early in the third period. The game was often physical and the East Kings defensive core of Zack Kennie, Matthew Gillis, Kayleb Lazaric, Isaac Ueffing and Blake Hayes shut down the Cape Breton attack. With less than two minutes left to play, Scott Duncan picked up the puck, fed a pass over to Logan Phillips who blasted a one-timer into the net to go up 5 to 4. The Winterhawks went back to the hotel to celebrate Stephen Walker's and Blake Hayes' 13th birthday. News came through later that evening that the boys would be facing the Charlottetown Abbies at 8:00 am Sunday morning in the Semi Final game. Parents and the coaching staff were all surprised to hear the boys say they wanted to get to bed early so they would be fresh for the Abbies. The Winterhawks played and lost to the Abbies last fall at the Emera Fuels Pee Wee AAA Challenge Cup. After some careful consideration, the coaches made a strategic line change to counteract the strength of Charlottetown's big line. Nick Bawn, Brett Feeney and Jacob Gerrits were given a special assignment as a strong back checking line to "shut down the Abbies". The Hawks came out flying and pressed the attack. Travis Hall came up with some huge saves, including a classic picking a top shelf shot out of thin air while in the splits. Although the Abbies took a 1 to 0 lead into the third period, Reg Rand scored to tie the game up on the first shift of the third period. The Winterhawks pressed on and Phillips fed a beautiful pass across to Duncan who blasted a shot past the Abbies goalie. The defense went on to shut down the powerful Abbies for the rest of the third period with lots of back checking from the forwards. At the end of the Game, the Winterhawks learned the Dieppe Voyagers defeated the Truro Bearcats by a score of 6 to 1 in the other semi-final game and they would be playing the powerful team from Moncton in the Final Game at 2:00 pm that afternoon. The Winterhawks knew the Dieppe team would be tough to beat. Coach Rand kept the same line up as the Charlottetown game and told the players to out work the Voyagers in every aspect of the game. Stephen Walker opened up the scoring late in the first period on a nice passing play from Duncan and Phillips. The 6 foot tall Dieppe defenseman Jeff Bell scored on a blistering slap shot that trickled out of Trevor Samson's glove into the net to tie the game 1 to 1. In the second period, Walker jumped on a loose puck in Dieppe's crease to give the Winterhawks a 2-1 lead. Dieppe tied the game up and kept pressing the Hawks hard. Late in the second period, Stephen rushed end to end, scoring his third goal of the game and gave the team a 3 to 2 lead. Things turned a little ugly in late in the second period when one of the Dieppe players was ejected from the game after boarding and injuring Matthew Gillis. The Hawks played inspired hockey all during the third period and shut down the Voyagers. Trevor Samson came up with a number of huge saves and Coach Rand was overheard to say "it's like having a sheet of plexi-glass across the front of our net". When the buzzer sounded to end the game, the Winterhawks let out a mighty cheer. Stephen Walker was selected by the SPUD organizers as the MVP for the Tournament and received a $300 certificate for skates. After receiving the trophy, the boys skated a few laps around the "big mac" to a song they all knew the words to. They invited all of the parents, siblings and friends into the dressing room after the game so all could see the beautiful trophy, banner, jackets and to kiss the spud. - Dave Duncan, Manager February 9, 2004

 

---

Published by: East Kings Minor Hockey Association
Last Updated: February 10, 2004
Contact: [email protected]