It would have been a crummy end to a stellar season for Castle Rock if they didn’t eke out a win on Sunday at the Canada Games Centre.
The Whitehorse team finished the regular season in first place in the house league with 34 wins and three losses.
Castle Rock captured the bantam title with a tight 3-2 win over Dawson City’s Klondike Kings in the division final of the Whitehorse Minor Hockey Association’s Year End Tournament.
“It was a really good season, we had a really strong team this year,” said Castle Rock head coach Ken Olsen. “We actually gave up three players halfway through to help one of the other teams.
“We had an injured goalie and injured forward who had a hat trick last night, so we knew this was going to be a tough one.”
After a scoreless first period, Castle crew centre Geordeon Huebschwerlen broke the ice with a shorthanded goal late in the second. Huebschwerlen then scored on the power play early in the third and later assisted teammate Zarek Jones on the game winner.
“He’s very good with the puck, very skilled,” said Olsen of Huebschwerlen. “He doesn’t quit. And he gets double-shifted a lot ... He’s a very good hockey player.”
Parker Olson and Robbie McConnell assisted Huebschwerlen on the first two goals.
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“We took a couple extra penalties and were killing penalties for a good portion of the second and third period,” said Kings head coach Steve Laszlo. “They capitalized on a couple of those chances and that might have been the difference in the game.”
Dawson’s two third-period goals came from Caleb Verdonk, making it 3-1, and Francis Bouffard, making it 3-2.
The visiting Klondike Kings actually play in Dawson’s oldtimer hockey league and finished the regular season in first place.
“We play in the oldtimers league up in Dawson because we don’t have enough guys to make up our own league,” said Laszlo. “We just kept practising the last couple weeks and ended up here.”
“John Dagostin, our goalie, played amazing,” he added. “I think this is his first or second year playing goal, so he really upped his game and made some tremendous saves to keep us in the games. He was a big reason for our success this weekend.”
Whitehorse Peewee Mustangs’ Dylan Cozens scored three straight goals to help give his team a 4-0 shut out win over Yukon Office Supply in the bronze medal game.
Isaac Williamson got the Mustangs’ game winner with 4:45 left in the first period.
Mustangs goalie Ethan Vanderkley was between the pipes for the shutout.
Contact Tom Patrick at
tomp@yukon-news.com