It was a nail-biting finish for the Stettler Midget A Storm, who came home from the A finals with a second-place finish after a triple-overtime loss to the Barrhead Steelers on Sunday, Jan. 10.
The team went unbeaten in the round-robin portion of the tournament, beating Innisfail 8-1 on Friday, Jan. 8, Strathcona 10-2 on Saturday, Jan. 9, and Barrhead earlier on Sunday 3-2.
In the final against Barrhead, Stettler was first on the board, with a first period goal by Tye Mulgrove. Another Mulgrove goal later in the first ended the period with a 2-0 score for Stettler.
Barrhead quickly closed that gap, tying up the game early in the second period. Jordan Lee put Stettler ahead again with less than three minutes remaining in the second period, but that was tied up again before the buzzer. The third period, despite scrambling play by both teams, remained scoreless.
In the third round of overtime, a goal by Koby Adams of Barrhead, with 15 seconds left, gave Barrhead the win.
The Stettler B Storm played in the B finals against Vermillion, after a mixture of wins and losses in the round-robin.
On Friday, Stettler B triumphed over St. Paul with a 6-2 win, then creeped ahead of the Castor-Coronation-Consort 3Cs with a 3-2 finish. The last game on Saturday pitted the team against Vermillion, who won 5-2.
The final was a tight game, even though the score didn't reflect that, Apryl Cassidy, one of the tournament organizers, said. The 7-0 loss to Vermillion looks like a blow-out on paper, but it was a game where both teams played well — one team just couldn't pull together it's opportunities.
The Stettler C Storm was eliminated from the C finals, which pitted Vegreville against Red Deer. The C Storm played first against Red Deer, winning 6-4, then against Okotoks, losing 5-3. A 10-5 loss to Vegreville on Sunday knocked the team out of the finals.
In other hockey news...
Stettler's Atom B Storm headed to Coronation on Sunday, Jan. 10, where they lost to Coronation 9-0. Atom C headed to Sylvan Lake, where they lost in a hard-fought game, with a tally of 9-4. Two goals by Brandon Enyedy and solos from Rylen Mohn and Adam Kromm put Stettler on the board.
Stettler Peewee B also headed to Sylvan Lake, this time on Jan. 9, where they lost 5-4. Tyson Brower and Jacob Cottam skated away with two goals each.
The girls' Peewee, Bantam and Midget girls all played on Saturday, Jan. 9.
Stettler's Peewee Girls headed to Ponoka, where they lost 6-1. Megan Resch scored Stettler's lone goal.
The Bantam girls triumphed 4-3 over home-team Warburg, with two goals by Emily Reiman and solos by Kacee Ward and Selena Sharpe to win the day.
The Stettler Midget Girls' team headed to Rocky, where they beat the West Central Midget team 3-0. Two goals by Kierra Scollo were augmented by one by Madison Kuefler, guaranteeing the win.