After a one-sided away game last Friday night that ended with a 4-0 loss against the Alberta Colleges Athletics Conference top team NAIT, the Portage College Voyageurs returned to their home arena at the Bold Center on Saturday for the rematch — and did much better.
The aggressive play from the Clippers took away from the fact they are out of the playoff race in the basement of the league, while NAIT is in top spot. The close game between the two ended with a score of 5-4 to NAIT with Voyageurs trying to equalize—and almost did— right till the final second of the third period.
Voyageurs forward Eli Jarvis and defender Arseny Bangoura limits the opponents options by closing in from both sides
Voyageurs' head coach, Nate Bedford was proud of his team's hard work all weekend and said that they will always move forward towards improvement and keep on trying to up their game as much as they can.
"I liked that we kept competing right till the end. I think, often teams can take some shortcuts and quit, but our guys just kept going. I am really proud of our guys continuing to try tp push the envelope a little bit and see what we can get out of it. So, it was a good game for us," Bedford said.
Bedford was especially happy with his team's defence, especially with some of the crucial saves Voyageurs goaltender, Taryn Kotchorek had made in the game.
"He was good all weekend...It's a lot of fun when he's playing like that and I thought he has been excellent here for a while," Bedford added, "We just gotta do a better job of getting some more goals early and then it wouldn't be very hectic for him but, really proud of that kid."
The Voyageurs are currently five points back of the sixth and final spot in the nine-team league for playoffs. The team has six regular season games left before playoffs.
The Voyageurs are up against Red Deer next weekend, for a Friday and Saturday series. The Friday February 15 game goes at the Bold Center's Performance Arena. The puck drops at 7 pm.
