For most of the Forestry Hockey League playoff week, Quesnel had seemed to morph into Hawkins, Indiana, as upside down playoff results dominated the early going.
However, in the end, a semblance of order prevailed as Fraser River destroyed Serenity’s hopes of a fairy-tale ending in the 3-1 final on Friday night.
Serenity had been the stunning surprise in the round robin as they posted a 2-0-1 record to easily qualify for the final, despite being the doormats of the regular season.
They started it all off on Tuesday with a tardy Easter miracle, as they snapped their eight-game losing streak versus Bear with a 3-2 shocker.
The next night they impressively came back from a late two goal deficit to tie Fraser River 3-3, all before punching their ticket to the final with a 2-1 squeaker over BCS.
The Chevy Crew’s rough road to the final began with a Barlow Avenue pothole, as they dropped their opener against Blue Collar by a 2-1 margin.
Hanging on to tie Serenity 3-3 was a huge momentum shift, as they defeated Bear on Thursday 3-2 and then became cheerleaders in the Serenity-BCS contest.
A BCS victory or tie versus Serenity would have eliminated Fraser River from Cup contention, so they were more than happy with Serenity’s 2-1 win.
The surprising last place seed after the round-robin turned out to be Bear, who had reeled off an astonishing 11-0-1 record since the new year.
Their only points in the preliminary round were against their foes for the bronze medal, as they had handily defeated BCS 5-2 on Wednesday evening.
Meanwhile Blue Collar had squandered two chances to make the final with back-to-back losses to Bear and Serenity and definitely played a bit harder than Bear, winning the early Friday game 7-3.
With at least 100 people on hand for the Lumber Cup Final, Serenity took an early lead as Derek “Gumby” Burdekin turned on the afterburners to give the Builders a 1-0 lead at the half.
There must have been some tongue lashing in the Fraser River room during zamboni time, as they came out flying to start the half with Jim “Soupy” Sales playing more like “Tiger” Williams as he scored to tie it and then set up Ian Hannah “Montana” for the go-ahead goal.
That cued a furious final 10 minutes, as both teams laid it on the line with Serenity’s Richard Ward “Off Evil” and Fraser Rivers “Very” Garry Parry standing on their heads to keep it a one goal game.
With time winding down, versatile D-man turned winger, Eric “Frantic” Stanick scored the biggest goal of his FHL career to salt away Fraser River’s first Lumber Cup victory since 2012.
Unfortunately for Serenity, the heartbreaking loss extends their fruitless cup quest to seven unlucky years.
Our Cup runneth over:
Thanks to Garry Horley, the Groll’s and Grant for all the scorekeeping!
To all the players from Bear and BCS who watched the final game and then helped Fraser River celebrate into the night!
Don Cherry thumbs up to Brody Neighbour who broke his nose on Thursday and played with 2 shiners on Friday!
Thanks to Jim, Jim, Ryan and Corey for keeping things under control.
Our thoughts go out to the Humboldt Broncos Family
