Staff
They needed one more dose of comeback magic but it wasn’t in the cards for the Fort Frances Atom ‘AA’ Canadians.
A late second-period goal by Joshua McKillop was enough to give the Westfort Maroons a 3-2 win in the final of the Canadians’ home tournament Sunday at the Ice For Kids Arena.
With a defender on either side of him in the goal crease, McKillop squirted free and dove to knock the puck past Canadians’ goalie Ethan Lengyel with 51.4 seconds on the clock to make it 3-1 for the visitors.
A subsequent 2-on-1 before the end of the period involving Brandon Croswell and Nolan Mann could have flipped the momentum right back in the Canadians’ favour.
But Mann was turned away in close by Maroons’ goalie Oliver Tuchenhagen, who made a number of tough saves all game.
Mann got partial revenge with 11.1 seconds left in the third—depositing Trent Hunter’s feed behind Tuchenhagen after the Canadians had pulled their goalie during a power play for a 6-on-4 advantage.
It was too little, too late, however, as the ensuing face-off was chipped harmlessly into the Westfort end as the buzzer sounded.
Koda Radigan had the arena jumping just 1:19 into the game when he finished off a set-up from Landon Lowes and Croswell for a 1-0 Canadians’ lead.
But Westfort, who lost 3-1 to the Canadians during the round-robin, responded with a pair before the end of the period.
Cameron Atkins won a battle for the puck in the right corner before stepping out and roofing a shot over Lengyel’s shoulder at 8:38.
Kai Vanska then made a spectacular-looking play just over three minutes later.
He got a step on Canadians’ blueliner Kathryn Fischer after she slipped, then wristed a shot from the left circle past Lengyel’s glove just before losing his footing and sailing through the air.
The Canadians came up empty on two other power-play chances in the game.
Fort Frances advanced to the final with a heart-pounding 3-2 victory over the Kenora Thistles—the Canadians’ first win this season in three tries against the team.
The locals trailed 2-1 after Sawyer Peters’ second-period marker was followed by Shai Vanwalleghem completing a 2-on-1 with Nickolas Fagnilli by executing a nifty backhand deke before going upstairs on Lengyel early in the third.
Hunter, who already had one top-shelf beauty on his résumé in the game to give his side a 1-0 lead in the first, did it again at 7:01 by streaking down the left wing and cutting inside on his defender before beating Thistles’ goalie Cooper Thompson.
A big penalty kill of Evan Kabel’s tripping minor with 4:25 to play kept the Canadians’ hopes alive.
Then the whole arena roared to life when Mann got three whacks at a rebound of Darnell Kempf’s shot—eventually batting the third one past Thompson with 25.1 seconds left for the decisive tally.
It was a goaltending duel without a winner in the Canadians’ opener as they played the Dryden Paper Kings to a scoreless tie.
Kade Oster was rock solid for Fort Frances between the pipes but was matched save-for-save by Brayden Landrie.
In their round-robin win over Westfort, Kempf had a goal and also assisted on Hunter’s power-play goal.
Radigan had the other Canadians’ marker.
Fort Frances then locked up first place in the round-robin by shooting down the Red Lake Rockets 7-1.
Kempf and Emerson Evans led the way with a pair of goals each while Hunter, Croswell (power play), and Kabel (short-handed) added singles.
