The Okotoks Oilers left no room for doubt with a provincial gold medal on the line.
The Okotoks Oilers left no room for doubt with a provincial gold medal on the line.
On the heels of a nail-biting semifinal, Okotoks scored nine times for the third time in the tournament to run away with the 9-1 victory over the Sherwood Park Fuzion and take home the Peewee Female A provincial championship, Sunday at the Scott Seaman Sports Rink.
“I think the girls believed that they could comeback and do anything they needed to do,” said Okotoks head coach Mel Crowson. “The whole season has been like that for us. We will have a bad game, come back and have a great game, but they've just been building their belief, building their skill, building their confidence the whole season long.
“Finally at the end of the season we had a game where everyone had a good game and when we do that we have a great game as a team.”
In the semifinal earlier in the day, the team twice erased deficits to edge the Edmonton Swarm 4-3 in overtime.
Reilly Crowson notched the game-winner with 5:51 left in overtime after earlier turning the tide with Okotoks' first marker on a shorthanded breakaway late in the second period. Grace Page added the other two goals in a rollercoaster third period.
“We were super excited and we were ready to go play again,” said Reilly Crowson of the semifinal win. “It was very back and forth, you got the butterflies a lot. When they were up, you still believed in each other, but it was still heartbreaking in a way because if you lost you were out.”
Okotoks took full advantage of its opportunity in the final.
Crowson opened the scoring midway through a strong opening frame. The hosts took the game over in the middle period, scoring three in a span of 8:16 to leap into a 4-0 advantage. Anika Peters scored twice, the first on a highlight reel breakaway goal while shorthanded, and defender Kiera Dowell found the back of the net on a seeing eye point shot.
The onslaught continued in the final stanza. After netminder Hannah Saunders stood tall with a series of ten-bell saves, the Oilers went down the ice and scored twice in 15 seconds as Peters completed the hat-trick followed on the next shift by Sienna McClinchey's tally.
“Before the game I was kind of iffy, like I don't know if I can do this,” Peters said. “But my team built me up to know that I can play the game I played today.”
The Fuzion got on the board midway through the period, answered by three unanswered Oilers goals through Madison Berven, Page and Crowson. Saunders stopped 25 of 26 shots faced in a strong showing in goal.
“Our whole season was building up to this game,” said Oilers blueliner Chloe Kinghorn. “We worked hard every practice, every game we were on it. We had a really great league, won our playoffs and were just working so hard to get to this point.”
A remarkable turnaround from the previous meeting between the squads one-day prior.
The Fuzion doubled up the Oilers 4-2 in the round-robin finale on Saturday to take top spot in the division entering the playoffs.
“That round-robin game at the end of the day didn't mean anything in terms of making the playoff round, but it was a good learning experience for the girls in seeing how good that Sherwood Park team is,” the coach added. “And then realizing that to beat them in the finals they were going to have to play the best game they can and they went and did that.”
Okotoks opened the tournament with a pair of dominant performances. The Oilers took it to GHC White by a 9-1 count on the strength of a Sabrina Allen hat-trick and a three assist showing from Page. They then blitzed Red Deer by a 9-2 score with Peters pacing the offence with two goals and an assist, Crowson chipping in with three helpers and Kaci McInenly scoring twice.
Crowson was the tournament's top scorer with seven goals and 14 points in five games. Peters, Page, McClinchey and Berven all finished top-10 in tournament scoring.
The Oilers are: Reilly Crowson, Anika Peters, Grace Page, Sienna McClinchey, Madison Berven, Kaci McInenly, Sabrina Allen, Mya Lawrence, Jordynne Hojnocki, Elyssa Williams, Kiera Dowell, Natalie Gurr, Paige Williams, Chloe Kinghorn, Evyn Landymore and Hannah Saunders.
For more information on the tournament go to peeweefemalea.haprovincials.ca
