Cougars versus Giants, again.
For the third year in a row, the Cariboo Cougars and Vancouver Northwest Giants will battle for the playoff championship in the B.C. Hockey Major Midget League. The Burnaby-based Giants celebrated victories in 2010 and 2011 but Cariboo head coach Trevor Sprague envisions a different outcome this time.
"I hope the tides have turned, maybe," he said with a chuckle. "Third time for the Cariboo Cougars to actually come out on top, but time will tell and we'll see what happens."
The 15- to 17-year-old Cougars reserved their spot in the championship series when they beat the Vancouver Northeast Chiefs 4-1 Saturday night at Kin 1. In the best-of-three semifinal series, the Cats took Friday's opener 6-2.
The Giants, meanwhile, went the distance and then some in their semifinal against the underdog Greater Vancouver Canadians. The Giants prevailed 4-1 on Friday, lost 2-1 on Saturday and then survived with a 3-2 overtime decision on Sunday.
The Giants and Cougars finished first and second respectively during the regular season. The Chiefs were third and the Canadians were fifth.
The best-of-three final will start Friday night in Burnaby.
In Saturday's semifinal clincher against the Chiefs, the Cougars trailed 1-0 after 20 minutes but scored two beautiful goals in the second period to take the lead. First, Brett Roulston slammed a Chiefs player hard into the boards and the resulting turnover allowed captain Tanner Fjellstrom to power into the slot and send a high backhander past goalie Jeffrey Smith. Then, on what proved to be the winning goal, Jake LeBrun fired a hard cross-ice pass to the top of the crease, where Hayden-James Berra found the twine with a re-direct.
In the third period, Brett Harris gave the Cats some insurance when he finished off a four-on-two rush. Then, at the 18:51 mark, Ryan Forbes hit an empty net.
The most impressive statistic in the two-game set was the low goals-against total for the Cougars. The Chiefs were the league's highest-scoring team during the regular season, averaging five goals per game, but only scored those three against the defensively-sound Cats.
"It's something we've been working on for the last month," Sprague said. "The guys are buying in. Your paycheque is made in your own end. To get out of this series as well as we did, it made [the players] believers [in team defence]. You need to have good goaltending too and David Readman played well. He played to let us win and that was great."
Berra was ecstatic about the victory and, after the game, was still buzzing about the winning goal.
"I was fortunate enough to have the defenceman not notice me and Jake did all the work -- I just got my stick down and he hit me on the perfect angle," said the 17-year-old Berra. "I credit that one to Jake. That was an outstanding effort to take it wide and to hit me perfectly. He couldn't have done a better job on that."
Cariboo defenceman Ryan Gagnon, who had a hat trick on Friday night, was proud of his club's weekend effort.
"We came together as a team," said Gagnon, a 15-year-old Quesnel product who scored four goals in 38 regular-season contests. "We got pucks deep and made passes. We just really played as a team to get the win."
The Cougars definitely have the Chiefs' number. The Cats have now eliminated the Chiefs from the playoffs four times in the past five years. In 2011, the teams didn't meet in the post-season.
"[The Cougars] are well-coached and they do a really good job of not letting the other team get opportunities in this rink," said Chiefs coach Doneau Menard.
"I'm really proud of my guys," he added. "We have the smallest draw zone in the league and every year we battle hard. We were fortunate to have some high-scoring kids this year but we also have to scrape and claw for our points and this year these guys played really well for us."
