BONNYVILLE – It was back-to-back wins to finish off the Bonnyville Jr. A Pontiacs regular season.
The Pontiacs are heading into playoffs on a high note after besting the Grande Prairie Storm twice over the weekend.
Head coach Rick Swan described the 33-win season as the “fourth best I’ve had in my seven years here.”
“If you put things into perspective, it’s the 11th best season in terms of wins in our 29-year franchise history, which would be considered good with no expectations,” he noted. “But, I think with a 41-win season last year and 40-win season three years ago, our expectations are so high that we always want to be up in the 40-win range.”
Pontiacs came to win
Tensions were high when the Pontiacs won 5-3 over the Grande Prairie Storm on Saturday, Feb. 22.
The first point of the game didn’t happen until the 15-minute mark in the first, Pontiac Daine Dubois capitalized on the powerplay to put the home team on the scoreboard.
Grande Prairie quickly answered to tie it up at one apiece, but Bonnyville’s Matthew McKim found the back of the Storm’s net to give them a 2-1 lead before the frame was through.
Pontiac Thomas Kramer added another point to Bonnyville’s lead five minutes into the second.
A short-handed goal from Grande Prairie brought the score to 3-2 heading into the third.
The final period saw Pontiacs Cam Newton and Chayce Schmidt add their names to the scoresheet, followed by a point from the Storm, ending the night 5-3 in Bonnyville’s favour.
Success on home ice
The Pontiacs ended their regular season on a high note when they defeated the Storm 2-1 on Sunday.
“It was good to get the win. That was the result we wanted,” exclaimed Dubois. “It’s what we wanted going into the playoffs, to be trending in the right direction.”
The Storm kept Bonnyville off the scoreboard until Austin Saint snuck the puck past Grande Prairie’s goalie with less than four minutes left in the period.
“It was a great play by Dubois,” Saint recalled. “He went to the net and I just followed up for the rebound.”
With under two minutes remaining in the first, the Storm tied it up 1-1.
A scoreless second frame had the Pontiacs come out of the dressing room for the third determined to head into playoffs fresh off a win.
Exactly one minute into the final period, Pontiac Bruce McGregor gave the home team the lead they needed to win 2-1.
Dubois described his last regular season home game in the Jr. A league as bittersweet.
“It was good to get the result we wanted, but it was a little sad,” he added.
According to Saint, everyone on the team wanted to play their hearts out for the graduating players.
“It was the 20-year-olds last regular-season game that they’ll play in junior hockey, so we did it for them, and I think we did a good job.”
Swan added, “We came out a little flat in the first period and we knew it wasn’t good enough. We had the 20-year-olds speak to the players and they said ‘guys, this is all I want from you: I want you to give your very best effort, and if you do that, you gain my respect.’ I think the second and third reflect that message that they had.”
The Pontiacs now turn their attention to playoffs, where they’ll be facing the Drayton Valley Thunder in round one of the best of seven-game series.
“They’re a good team. We’ve got to take them as hard as we can every shift because we know what they’re capable of. We’re going to do our homework, do a lot of hard practices, and a lot of attention to details because that’s going to be the difference,” Dubois stated.
Swan stressed the importance of fine-tuning parts of their game.
“Our best players have got to be our best players, and I’m looking forward to it. I’ve got goosebumps and excitement because I know we’ve got to work every single day.”
The Pontiacs have home-ice advantage for the first two games of the series on Saturday, Feb. 29 and Sunday, March 1.
