Staff
The local Taggs Source for Sports Bantam ‘AA’ hockey team competed in its eighth and final tournament of the season last weekend in Brandon, Man., coming home with silver after compiling a 4-1 record.
Taggs opened play against a very talented Interlake Lightning team, and surprised the Lightning in handing them only their second loss of the season.
The Lightning played a strong, physical game and opened up a three-goal lead in the first. But the local squad decided to apply a little grit of their own, and turned the game around with goals by Jeff Davis, Tarran Romyn, and Tyler Fontana in the second period.
The Lightning replied with one goal before intermission, then added another early in the third for a 5-3 lead. Taggs stormed back, however, as Jordan Larson scoring midway through the period and then Davis converted on a tremendous short-handed effort to tie it 5-5.
With just three minutes to go, Nick Jourdain saucered a nice pass over a defender’s stick onto the tape of Colton Spicer, who fired home the game-winner for an exciting 6-5 victory.
Taggs’ goalie Scott Parsons, after being briefly replaced in the first by Brennan Carroll, turned aside 41 of 46 shots to earn the win.
Their second pool game had Taggs facing the Springfield IceHawks. Larson opened the scoring in the first, only to have the IceHawks respond with two in the second.
Things looked even more dire for Taggs after Romyn was assessed a five-minute major penalty, but the team responded with two successive short-handed goals from Nick Kaun and Jon Carlson to turn the tide in their favour.
Carlson, the team captain, continued his fine play by firing home a power-play marker just before intermission to give Taggs a two-goal cushion after two periods.
The third period saw Taggs blow the game open with four unanswered goals by Jason Goldamer, Larson, Davis, and Dylan Grinsell for the 8-2 win.
Carroll turned aside 24 shots for the win between the pipes.
Taggs next played the St. James Canadians from Winnipeg—and dominated from the opening face-off in a 10-5 win.
After the teams traded a pair of goals in the first, Taggs broke the game open with four second-period goals and never looked back.
Davis and Larson were the key contributors, combining for seven goals, with Davis scoring four and Larson adding three. Carlson had a goal and three assists, with singles netted by Cole Godbout and Fontana.
Carroll turned aside 30 of 35 shots to pick up his second-straight win.
After finishing first in Group ‘A’, Taggs then played the Southeast Blizzard from Steinbach, Man., who had finished second in Pool ‘B’.
Taggs came out strong and jumped to a 5-2 lead early in the second. But the Blizzard created a storm of their own in the middle period, scoring four unanswered goals to take a slim 6-5 lead into the third.
Taggs took good advantage of the intermission to regroup, and replied with three unanswered goals in the third for a back-and-forth 8-6 win.
Grinsell contributed two key goals in the third while Larson continued his strong play with two goals and four assists. Davis added a pair of goals, with singles going to Romyn and Kaun.
Parsons faced 34 shots for the win in goal.
The victory set up a championship rematch with the Lightning. Alas, the previous hard-hitting games seemed to have taken its toll on the Fort Frances team while the Lightning were poised for revenge.
Taggs failed to capitalize on some early first-period chances and found themselves down 4-0 at intermission.
The Lightning carried the momentum into the second, and pushed their comfortable lead to 7-1 after two periods.
Although Taggs tried another valiant comeback, scoring two early goals in the third to close the gap to 7-3, they would get no closer and ran out of steam down the stretch in a 9-3 loss.
Larson again led the attack with a hat trick, and was selected as Taggs’ player of the game in four of their five. Davis was selected the MVP in the other game.
The Lightning had advanced to the final after a hard-fought 6-5 win over the host Brandon Wheat Kings in the other semi-final.
The tournament capped a fine season for Taggs, who finished with five gold-medal wins at tournaments in Dryden, Thunder Bay, Sault Ste. Marie, Kenora, and right here in Fort Frances.
