Jan 13, 2014 | Patrick Watson | 352 views
Saginaw Championship Final-Game 5
After 4 tough games, lots of sweat and a few tears here we are in Saginaw Michigan and the final game is to be played by two Canadian teams. The Sault St. Marie Electric Zappers finished at the top of their division and are 4-0 coming into the final. We are also at the top of our division coming into this final game 4-0. The emotions were running high in the dressing rooms and nobody wanted to go home in 2nd place........IT"S GAME DAY! ARE YOU READY!!!!!
Our opponent from the north was big and tough and played a very rough and chippy style of hockey but we were NOT intimidated by their tactics. 2:25 into the first period Noah Zebregts made an incredible rush from his spot on defense and opened the scoring. This was the start we hoped for and the kids were pumped. Next to score was Caden Brown about a minute and a half later. The Sault team really got rough and our kids were being hacked and slashed much more than you would expect to see in a Novice game. The intensity was high and we tried to keep our team focused on playing hockey. The refs did a good job calling the penalties on the Sault team with 6 called and I am proud to say our kids did not retaliate and we played the game penalty free.
In the second period Casey Bridgewater and a Sault player collided and both went down hard. No penalties were called and Casey was OK but the Sault player was down for several minutes (which seemed like hours) and everyone was worried about his condition. Casey said the heel of his skate came down hard on the upper chest/neck area but the player was not cut. Eventually he got up and skated back to the bench and everyone was relieved he was not seriously injured. The intensity our team was displaying disappeared after this incident because everyone was so concerned about the Sault player. Two minutes later the injured Sault player was back on the ice and scored on us narrowing the score to 2-1. Ironically, this was the spark we needed to get back in the game. The whole team turned up the dial and never looked back.....Zack Deleary scored a beauty later in the 2nd and then another early in the 3rd making the score 4-1 with 8 minutes to go. Our game plan was simple.....keep pressing and make sure our defense doesn't get caught. We need another goal to take the wind out of their sails and Casey scored our final goal at 6:47 of the 3rd period. The score was 5-1 and we managed control most of the play late in the 3rd. When the buzzer sounded the kids, coaches and parents went nuts!!!!
WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS!!!!!!!
After the celebrating we all lined up on the blue lines and the teams received their trophies. The Sault team went home with a very nice finalist trophy for each player. Now it was our turn to receive our trophies.....Noah and Eric were presented with the Championship Team Trophy and all of our players and coaches were called up 1 by 1 to receive their individual trophy. WOW...the kids were so happy and excited to take home the gold!!!!!!
We want to thank all the parents and grand parents and other family and friends for making the trip to Saginaw and cheering the boys on loud and proud. GREAT JOB COUGARS!!!!