The Okotoks Oilers are going where they’ve never gone before.
The Okotoks Oilers are going where they’ve never gone before.
Okotoks is off to its first Alberta Junior Hockey League final in franchise history after dispatching the pesky Brooks Bandits with a 4-2 victory Sunday night at the Centennial Regional Arena to take the South Final in six games.
“It means everything to us,” said Oilers captain Carter Huber. “It’s such a great community, there is so much support from the fans and to get through the South Final and do that for the town of Okotoks is huge for us.”
In Game 6, Jacob Bernard-Docker, a workhorse logging major minutes on the blueline in the series, notched his fourth of the playoffs to open the scoring with 1:25 left in the opening period after Brooks held the early edge in play.
The Oilers looked to have broken the game wide open in a dizzying middle stanza.
Tanner Laderoute was in the middle of the offensive outburst, scoring his sixth and seventh of the playoffs in a 97 second span. Austin Wong quickly made it a four-goal lead as Okotoks looked to be in complete control.
Not so fast.
Brooks followed the series trend, shrugged off the tough start and fired back in short order.
In the final 10 minutes of the period, Will Garin scored his second in as many games and power forward Mack Hancock added a marker on a deft deflection to cut the lead to 4-2.
There would be no nail-biting finish in the elimination game.
Okotoks allowed just six shots against in the third period and Riley Morris steadied the visitors with a 25-save performance.
“We regrouped in that intermission and had a solid third,” Huber said. “We really took a lot of pride in our d-zone and kept pucks in their zone as much as we could.
“Credit to them, they never gave up, they fought hard. We had leads throughout the series and they fought back.”
Impressively, the team managed to close out the series with key rookie centre and penalty killer Blake Wells out of the lineup with an injury.
"It really speaks to our depth when we have a guy injured like Wells, he plays quite a bit of minutes and plays PK," Laderoute said. "We just have a really good group of guys here, we trust each other
The victory snapped Brooks three-year reign as South Division champions. It’s the first time the green-and-gold have beat the Bandits in the post-season since 2007.
"The rivalry with Okotoks and Brooks is always there. It was a big game for the organization, not just us individual players," said defenceman Carson Beers, a fourth-year Oiler. "Brooks has taken it to us over the years and we all knew what was on the line, not just for us, but for these people in the organization. We played with them in our hearts and tried to show how grateful we are for all they did for us.
"Me and Morris, we've been around for a while here and we're both a little shocked we beat Brooks in a playoff series."
The Oilers will meet the North Division champion Spruce Grove Saints in the AJHL final.
It took three straight victories and overtime dramatics to punch their ticket.
Okotoks rode a three-goal first period to a 4-3 victory over the Brooks in Game 5 on Friday in front of 2,000 at Pason Centennial Arena.
“It was special having everyone cheer for us,” said Oilers forward Marc Pasemko. “We carried it over from the triple overtime (in Game 4), we saw that the crowd was sold out and built off that.”
Wong, Pasemko and Nick Blankenburg staked Okotoks to a 3-0 lead in the first period with Huber notching the key insurance marker on a third-period powerplay.
The true swing game of the series went the way of the Oilers in Game 4. Laderoute scored in triple overtime as Okotoks took the 5-4 result, kick-starting three straight wins to take the best-of-seven in six.
The AJHL championship series will get underway this weekend in Okotoks. The top-seed Oilers have home-ice advantage with Game 1 Friday at Pason Centennial Arena.
"From the 16-year-olds to the 21-year-olds, we're all super pumped about it," Laderoute said. "It's good to get the first one, but that's one banner and we want to go for a couple more here."
Go to okotoksoilers.ca for the latest schedule information.
