Joey Payeur
Luke Judson swears he’s telling the truth–the numbers are lying.
The Emo native insisted the story of Team Hockey Northwestern Ontario at the OHL Gold Cup in Kitchener this past week, for which he served as an assistant coach, can’t be summed up simply in the team’s 1-3-1 record and fourth-place finish in Group ‘A.’
“As far as the record goes, it doesn’t speak well of the team,” Judson conceded.
“But anyone who knows the history of this tournament knows that HNO had a good showing.
“In previous years, HNO didn’t ice a very competitive team,” he noted. “But this year, you could argue we were in four of the five games and had a real chance to win all of them.”
Team HNO, which featured Cooper Witherspoon of Fort Frances at forward, set a new team standard in its round-robin opener against Team Greater Toronto Hockey League Blue.
Even though they lost 5-4 in overtime, the point Team HNO got for getting to overtime was the first-ever one it had collected in the round-robin portion of the tourney.
“GTHL has six first-round OHL draft picks. We had one,” Judson stressed.
“Yet we took the game to overtime and anyone watching knew we had a chance to win it.”
Team HNO then was doubled 4-2 by Team Ontario Minor Hockey Association White before getting dumped 8-1 by Team Hockey Eastern Ontario.
After losing 5-1 to Team Alliance, Team HNO had one more shot to get in the win column in the matchup of the two fourth-place finishers in the two groups.
Thanks to Witherspoon’s first point of the tournament coming via a second-period goal, Team HNO blanked Team Northern Ontario Hockey Association 4-0.
“Cooper did great and got better as the tournament went along,” said Judson.
“He had the goal and he should have got an assist on another one in that game after some great forechecking.
“He was one of our top penalty-killers,” Judson added of Witherspoon.
“If he continues the way he’s going, he should have no problem continuing with his hockey career.”
When it came to being on the bench for just his second major tournament, Judson relished the opportunity.
“It was a learning experience and I had two great coaches alongside to help me out,” he remarked.
“I got lots of positives coming out of it and there will certainly be more coaching for me down the road.”
Team GTHL Red defeated Team OMHA Black 3-1 in the final.
Team HEO edged Team OMHA White 3-2 in the bronze-medal game.
