Pincher Creek's Huskies earn a spot in the Midget Tournament first-place game

Pincher Creek's Midget Huskies
(in red) vs Creston Bruins
C. Davis photo

Chris Davis, Pincher Creek Voice

A confident Pincher Creek Midget Huskies team took to the ice on Saturday afternoon, January 14 to face the Creston Bruins, the second game for them in the Midget tournament being held at Pincher Creek's MCC Arena this weekend.

The Huskies established their dominance immediately with a classic unassisted Brett Tarcon goal 32 seconds into the game.  A potential Bruins goal with 7:22 on the clock was denied when the whistle blew for a slashing penalty against Huskies #9 Blair Goodreau prior to the puck sliding into the Huskies net.  The Huskies harried the Bruins throughout the first period, but it took #16 Tarcon until 4:46 on the clock to score another, this time assisted by #11 Calahan Bruder.

Huskies #11 Clahan Bruder rushes the Creston net
C. Davis photo

The Bruins are a solid team, and provided the Huskies the kind of challenge they evidently enjoy, the kind of challenge that forces a team to play at the top of their game.

The Huskies took to the ice in the second period with the same fire that marked the first.  With 13:45 on the clock Huskies #23 Ryan Marshall had his turn to score, ably assisted by Calahan Bruder and Mackenzie Jordan.  Then #15 Tristan Doell scored again for the Huskies, assisted by Tarcon.  These two know how to work the net.  In fact, the whole Huskies offence was relentless.  At this point the score was 4-0 Huskies, and it was beginning to seem hopeless for the Bruins.  #11 Jackson Hawton fixed that for them, at least temporarily, by getting one past the Huskies defence with 10:57 on the clock. That didn't sit well with Huskies #21 Michael Roy so, with the assistance of Tarcon and Marshall, he made it up at 10:15 on the clock.  At 4:53 Doell scored again for the Huskies, making it 6-1.  You can see where this is going.  #9 Nick Motti scored at 4:30 on the clock for the Bruins, a goal that was to be their last in the game.  Tarcon scored again at 2:54, assisted by Bruder and Goodreau, closing out the period with the Huskies securely ahead 2-7.

Huskies vs Bruins in the Pincher Creek Midget Tournament
C. Davis photo

Huskies fan Donna Bruder was enjoying the game, and mentioned that all of the Doell's play or have played hockey for Pincher Creek, including the ladies.

In the third period the Bruins gave it everything they had, and managed to thwart many of the Huskies' scoring attempts.  Bruder scored once, assisted by Tarcon, and then Tarcon scored once more, assisted by Roy, in the declining minutes of the game.

C. Davis photo

Final score:  Huskies 9, Bruins 2

This victory ensured the Huskies their spot in the first-place playoff game, which will be held today, Sunday, January 15, starting at 1 pm.  They will be vying with the Sundre Huskies.  Come out and support this great team, who I firmly believe are most likely to emerge the top dog in this tournament.

After the game I spoke with Huskies Team Manager Ken Doell. "Our season has gone really well," he said. "We're 7 and 1 on the season,  we've only had one loss against, I believe it was Coaldale, 5-4 they beat us, that was before the Christmas break. Now we've come into our tournament here, we're going for the "A" finals here tomorrow, we won both our games, we don't know who that's against (it turns out to be the Sundre Huskies - Ed.)  I asked him what was up next for the Huskies after this tournament.  "We're doing a tournament down in Great Falls next weekend, going for the Casey Cup in the "A" side there. We're really looking forward to that.  It's nice because it's playing some different teams, some American teams.  After that we have a couple of away games against Kainai and Bow Island. Then we're preparing for Provincials, we're up against Claresholm for the first round of Provincials.  We've got lots on the go for sure. In the next two weeks we've got 7 games of hockey."

Doell gave a shout-out to the Huskies coaching staff, who have done a remarkable job again this season.  "You can't beat our coaching staff here, we've got a couple of veterans with Greg Shakel, he's our Head Coach, his son's stepped up to the plate (Assistant Coach Hayden Shakel) who payed AA Rockies his whole career, and we've got in a couple of younger guys. the kids just learn lots of good plays from playing with them."

C. Davis video