If you missed the women’s provincial hockey championship last week, you missed some skilled and high-tempo action that you won’t see again in the Hope Arena—until next year.
South Coast Women’s Hockey League president, Rick Kupchuk said on Monday, “The players and on-ice officials thoroughly enjoyed the weekend. People were saying it was great to get out of the Lower Mainland for a championship tournament. The arena staff were phenomenal all weekend and the players were able to just concentrate on playing hockey.
“The league has been around in some form for over 30 years — and this was without a doubt the best tournament yet. We made a quick decision that we want to do it [in Hope] again next year.”
Kupchuk made special mention of Jody Castle, manager of Recreation, Airpark and Culture Services, Agassiz-based linesman, Paul Fredrickson — and Shannon Jones, of Project Hope, for their contributions to the event.
The SWCHL is a nine-team league for women who have aged out of minor hockey but still want to play the sport at a high level. Most of the teams are from the Lower Mainland but Prince George, Kamloops and Victoria also field teams.
The top six squads made it to the championship playdowns — and the top four coming out of the round robins all had a chance to win top spot.
Round robin action began at 11, Friday morning, with the Fraser Valley Jets rolling over the Richmond Devils, who had a depleted bench.
“Richmond has a lot of university students who couldn’t get out of class, Friday,” explained Kupchuk. Those who were able to play got schooled by the Jets, whose goalie, Stacey Wilson was like a brick wall in net.
“Stacey was in goal for all four of their games and the Jets didn’t give up one goal all weekend,” said Kupchuk.
Payge Pena, of the Maple Ridge Moose played for four years at Saint Cloud State University in Minnesota and scored three goals in three games on the weekend. In game four, she didn’t even get out of her own defensive end.
“Their goalie hurt her knee in the Saturday night game, so Payge played goal for her. To my knowledge, she had never played goalie before,” said Kupchuk. South Fraser TNT took no mercy on the rookie netminder and beat the Moose 5-1 in the consolation game.
“The leading goal scorer was from the Kamloops Vibe, Rochelle Smith,” said Kupchuk. “She had six goals and no assists. The leading points getter was Kelsey Firkus, from the Fraser Valley Jets. In four games, she had four goals and three assists.”
The Jets and the Vibe had finished the season on top of the league, with 41 points each, so it was no surprise that they would meet in the final, Sunday. The first period had no scoring, then the Jets’ Alannah Kedra scored in the second frame and Firkus scored the insurance goal in the third — while Wilson kept all the Vibe’s shots in front of her, for a 2-0 victory.
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