Lucas Punkari
A year after being knocked from the top of the ACHA Division II women’s hockey ranks, the Rainy River Community College Voyageurs are queens of the heap once again.
The Voyageurs captured their third national title in the last four years Sunday afternoon in Kalamazoo, Mich. after a convincing 8-1 victory over the West Chester (Penn.) Golden Rams in the final.
“It’s a pretty good feeling to bring the title back up here once again,” noted Voyageurs’ coach Evan Amdahl.
“This was our goal all year long, and we jokingly said that we would ‘refuse to be number two in Kalamazoo.’
“The girls all worked really hard this year and they proved just that this past weekend,” Amdahl stressed.
The final against the Golden Rams was a rematch of a round-robin contest Saturday morning, which saw West Chester skate away with a surprising 4-1 victory.
“We ran into a really hot goaltender, and that was the difference there,” Amdahl said of Golden Rams’ netminder Aly Golia.
“She ended up being named to the all-tournament team, with that game really kick-starting that performance for her,” he noted.
“And one of their forwards [Becky Dobson] had a hat trick, so we knew that we had to focus on those two players in the final,” Amdahl added.
But Amdahl felt the key to his team’s triumph was their conditioning as the Voyageurs jumped out to a 4-0 lead after two periods of the final before adding four more goals in the last 20 minutes.
“Earlier this year, we played in a tournament in Winnipeg and had played four games in two days, so that really paid off down in Kalamazoo when we played four games in three days,” Amdahl explained.
Leading the way for the
Voyageurs in Sunday’s final was Rainy River native Brenley Anderson. The leading scorer in the entire ACHA this season netted a pair of goals and also had two assists.
“She had kind of been struggling the last couple of weeks going into this tournament,” Amdahl noted.
“But in the semi-finals [against South Dakota State], she found her game once again.
“And then in the final, she just broke out and came through for us,” he remarked.
Anderson’s return to form in the semi-finals against the Jackrabbits proved to be crucial in the Voyageurs’ title run as she notched a pair of goals in the 3-2 triumph, including the game-winner with 1:50 to go.
“That was basically like the finals for us,” Amdahl stressed.
“We knew that they [South Dakota State] were probably the team to beat in order to make it to the finals, and when she [Anderson] scored there late to win the game, it was pretty amazing.”
Another key contributor to the Voyageurs’ offensive attack was Emo’s Jessie Baker, who was rewarded for her efforts by earning the trophy as tournament MVP.
“She scored in almost every game, and she’s also a hard worker, which I think that says a lot about her,” Amdahl said.
“During the Christmas break, she [Baker] took it upon herself to work out and continue to get faster and stronger.
“And as you can see with getting the MVP award, those type of things do pay off,” Amdahl added.
Also honoured for their weekend performances were forward Stevie-Lee Langford and defenceman Kyla Thorne, who both joined Anderson on the all-tournament team.
While the obvious goal for the RRCC program is to repeat once again in 2012, it may prove to be a difficult task as the Voyageurs will be hit heavy by graduation losses.
“Right now we look to be having three forwards, three defenceman, and one goaltender [Fort Frances native Katelynn Stearns] coming back,” Amdahl noted.
“It’ll be a rebuilding year, and we’ll be building around those returning players as we move ahead,” he conceded.
“But winning the national title does help make recruiting players a little bit easier,” he quipped.
