Still buzzing from their provincial ‘C’ title last weekend in Drumheller, the bantam Warriors doubled down to win the 1660 Hockey League Tier 1 banner, defeating the Stony Plain Predators 2-1 in the best-of-three series.
Westlock started the series in the hole, dropping Game 1 4-3 at the Rotary Spirit Centre March 22. With their backs against the wall, the club rebounded with a gutsy road performance, shelling Stony Plain 6-2 March 24.
In a winner-take-all Game 3 played at the Rotary Spirit Centre March 25, the Warriors left it all on the ice and rolled to an impressive 6-3 win.
“It feels pretty good. We worked really hard, so I think we earned it,” said alternate captain Jonah Bennett. “John Zeise, our goaltender did really well.”
“We really had to dig deep for this one,” added Reid Schmidt. “We got a bit nervous but we pulled through with hard work.”
The Warriors drew first blood in Game 3 when Zaydin Nyuli and Justin Jennings found Seth Fairholm 11 minutes in —Stony Plain responded five minutes later to knot the contest 1-1 after 20 minutes.
Eight minutes into the second, Bennett and Jonathan Servage got the puck to Schmidt who capitalized on a powerplay to put the Warriors up 2-1.
Five minutes later, Dylan Biddiscombe found Nyuli on a breakaway, who put the puck past the Stony Plain goaltender to give the Warriors a 3-1 lead going into the third.
In the final frame the Warriors put their foot on the gas pedal and the Predators had no answer.
During a powerplay, Schmidt got a pass to Bennett who blasted the puck into the net to put them up 4-1. Sixty seconds later Owen Jespersen and Jennings found Fairholm who scored his second of the night to make it 5-1.
The Predators did show some life, scoring a pair of goals, however it was far too little as Thomas Oloske capped the night with an empty netter.
“We kind of let then go a bit,” said Zeise. “But we picked up the pace again and got the ‘W’.”
Most of the players admitted that they’ve been so focused on the game that the fact they just won two championships in only seven days hadn’t sunk yet.
“Provincials was first and league was second,” said Jespersen. “We won it all. It’s feels pretty good.”
Head coach Paul Olsen said it took the Warriors a game and a half to get going, but once they got into it they played like team and there was no looking back.
“We didn’t quite get a full 60 minutes of hockey out of them, but … close enough,” he joked.
