The Midget Warriors came out on top in their first best-of-three series of the Tier 2 1660 Hockey League playoffs with a couple hard-fought victories over Wetaskiwin, the first place team in the tier.
The Warriors visited the Wetaskiwin Civic Centre March 2 to open the series and managed to come away with a 4-3 win.
After falling behind by a goal two minutes into the first period, Westlock responded with a shorthanded goal from Jacob Reagan, with assists from Addison Weir and Ryley Booth, nearly halfway through the second.
Zaidyn Pipke then scored for the Warriors, with assists from Aiden Schmidt and Chase Jennings with less than three minutes left in the second period to make it a 2-1 game, but Wetaskiwin managed to tie it at two before the period ended.
The Warriors came out strong in the third with goals from Addison Weir, assisted by Jacob Reagan and Aiden Schmidt, and by Dylan Gabel, with assists from Braydie Teszeri and Benjamin Carlson.
“We were down 1-0 after one, then we ended up tied after two. We ran into some penalty trouble in the third but we killed it off,” said head coach Rick Dutchak.
Wetaskiwin managed to score another goal before the end of the game but it was too late as Westlock hung on for the 4-3 win.
Goalie Jayden Vandelagemaat stopped 42 of the 45 Wetaskiwin shots he faced for the win.
The Warriors returned home to the Rotary Spirit Centre March 3 and collected another win 6-4 to finish the series.
Benjamin Carlson scored the first goal of the game at 17:57 of the opening period. Dawson Petryshen and James Oloske came through with the assists on the goal.
After a Wetaskiwin goal a couple minutes later Pipke scored, with assists from Reagan and Jennings to make it 2-1, then Reagan scored his own goal, with assists from Teszeri and Jennings, to make it 3-1 going into the second.
Teszeri teamed up with Jennings and Weir to go up by three. Then Weir scored with another assist from Jennings.
The Warriors gave up one more before the end of the second but got it back halfway through the third on a goal from Weir and assists by Jennings and Oloske to make it 6-2.
It wasn’t the runaway it appeared to be though as Wetaskiwin scored two more before the end of the game to make the final score 6-4.
“We had a pretty comfortable lead but kind of took it too easy at the end. That team (Wetaskiwin) is kind of a hot and cold team,” said Dutchak.
“Something we’re going to have to do for the rest of the year as games get more important is learn to play defensively and not worry about offense, just worry about protecting our own net because we sure left our goalie hanging out to dry a few times,”
The midgets have been on a hot streak at exactly the right point in the season as they’ve already booked their trip to the provincial ‘C’ championships in Rimbey March 22-26. They now have a bye for next weekend as they await their next playoff opponent.
“We haven’t lost in a while,” said Dutchak. “We finished second, we made provincials and now we just beat the top team in the league. Now we’re two series away from going to the league final.”
