There is something to be said for momentum.
On the heels of successful tournaments heading into the new year, the Rocky Mountain Raiders captured lightning in a bottle to the tune of six straight victories to cap a nearly perfect month of action in the Alberta Major Midget Female Hockey League.
“We haven’t let up at all and between Notre Dame and the Mac’s it taught us to play at a much higher level all the time,” said Raiders head coach Paul Pozzi. “We had a couple games there where we had to be careful about getting too used to winning because you have to keep the level of play up.
“You never want to bring the level of play down to your opponents…That’s one thing we over-emphasized that we weren’t going to do.”
Rocky Mountain, the top seed in the AMMFHL, kept the good times rolling on Saturday by blanking one of the top contenders for the league crown, the Sherwood Park Fury, by a 3-0 count at the Scott Seaman Sports Rink in Davisburg.
Despite being outplayed for most of the first-period, the Raiders escaped with a one-goal lead when Okotokian Breanne Trotter found captain Nicolette Seper in the slot for the Cochrane native’s team leading 15th marker of the campaign.
Rocky Mountain turned the game on its head with a dominant second period, outshooting the visitors by a 15-6 margin and adding two more tallies for a three-goal advantage.
“It was actually fairly simple – what I’ve been stressing the last two years is just going to the net,” Pozzi said. “We like to bring the puck into the zone wide, gain the zone and just have a player or players going to the net. We scored two goals like that today.”
Trotter secured her first of two in the period when she was Johnny-on-the-spot for a ricochet off Seper on the powerplay. The Raiders captain then set up the Okotokian for a backbreaking marker with 1:06 left in the middle frame.
The Raiders’ sixth- straight victory came at the expense of their semifinal opponents at the Mac’s tournament and the top team out of the northern quadrant of the AMMFHL.
“It’s hard work and team work that’s the main goal for us,” Trotter said. “It’s more of a confidence thing. (The Mac’s) we were so excited and we’ve carried it out to our regular games.”
Trotter and fellow freshman Lacey DiMaulo have climbed into the top-15 in league scoring with tremendous months of January after both players led the province in Bantam goals and points last season.
“They struggled the first part of the year and I think it was just getting used to the tempo, the level of play, the size of the different girls, the speed of the different girls,” the coach added. “In Bantam they had such a strong team that they didn’t have to work that hard to be successful. It’s different here in Midget.
“They now know they have to work hard every shift.”
Rocky Mountain’s run came to a halt on Sunday in a 3-1 loss to the Red Deer Chiefs. The Raiders (18-4-1-2) remains comfortably in first place with 39 points.
The Raiders will look to remain cooler than the other side of the pillow with seven games separating the team from the post-season.
“We’re going to try and win all of them,” Trotter said.
It’s the kind of vertical ascension all teams strive for.
“There is really good recognition of plays, they’re practicing well, having fun together,” the coach added. “I’m so lucky to have such a great group of kids. It makes it easy.”
Next up, the Raiders and Fury renew acquaintances on Feb. 6 at the Scott Seaman Sports Rink at 2 p.m.
For full schedule information go to ammfhl-hockey.ca
