The Plamondon Cougars U15 squad are hoping to come out of Wainwright next weekend as North East Alberta Hockey League's Tier 4 champions. The Cougars and Wainwright Bisons are tied at one apiece in their best-of-three league finals after splitting a home and home series this past weekend.
The final game of the series is Sunday, March 13 back in Wainwright.
The Cougars lost their first game of the league-finale 4-3 on Saturday night in Wainwright, but rebounded in front of a noisy home crowd in the Plamondon Arena on Sunday afternoon, beating their opponents 4-2.
The two teams finished the regular season at the top of their seven-team division, with Wainwright in top spot with 42 points and 20 wins in their 28-game season and the Cougars in second spot with 36 points and 17 wins in their league games. The Cougars made it to the league finals in convincing fashion a week ago, shutting-out the Lloydminster Blazers in two-straight games 5-0 and 8-0.
Although the scoreboard showed an uneven result, the team's head coach Sara Doody says the games were hard-fought.
"The score doesn’t necessarily reflect how tough the games were. Our second game, the score was still 0 to 0, halfway through the second period," she said.
In Sunday's home game against Wainwright, the Cougars dominated play, allowing only 20 shots on Riley Clark in their own net wile peppering the Bison's goalie with 40.
Next Sunday's deciding game will be played at the Peace Memorial Arena in Wainwright. The puck drops at 3 pm.
Win or lose the league championships, the Cougars will continue onto a spot at provincial playdowns later this month as their division drew the wildcard spot, allowing the two top teams from the division to battle for the Alberta title.
