Joey Payeur
The ice surface of the Kenora Recreation Centre has been the hottest spot in Northwestern Ontario for Muskie victory dance parties this week.
One night after Fort High claimed the NorWOSSA girls’ hockey crown there against the St. Thomas Aquinas Saints, the Muskie boys repeated the feat with a 4-1 win over St. Thomas Aquinas to sweep their best-of-three final.
“It was so important to go in [to OFSAA] as champion and not going in having missed winning the title,” said Chase McGuire, whose natural hat trick on three wrist shots all from about 15 feet out had the Muskies leading 3-0 before the mid-point of the second period.
“You want the team to be reaching its climax going into OFSAA and be ready to put its best foot forward,” he reasoned.
The boys’ squad also extended Fort High’s string of NorWOSSA crowns to 10-straight–a streak that began in 2007.
The only hiccup was in 2013, when the black-and-gold won the “Northland Cup” in lieu of the NorWOSSA title due to a province-wide protest by public school teachers.
Ironically, the Muskies beat the Saints in a two-game total goal series that year.
But because of the labour dispute, St. Thomas Aquinas advanced to the OFSAA ‘A/AA’ championship that year due to being under the Catholic board jurisdiction that wasn’t affected by the teacher protest.
This time around, both teams will advance to the all-Ontarios here March 21-23, with the defending provincial champion Muskies automatically in the field as the host squad.
As such, the Saints go in as the NorWOSSA rep.
“As a competitor, this is what you play for,” said Jordan Sinclair, who won his first league title as head coach after being an assistant to Jamie Davis last season.
“You want to win and winning never gets old.”
Matt Booth, who sat out Game 1 in favour of Spencer Murphy after having played both semi-final games against the Sioux Lookout Warriors, was the target of an end-of-game mob scene in his crease in “K-Town” for the second-straight year after earning the clinching victory in last year’s final against the Kenora Broncos.
“It feels pretty good to win back-to-back,” he grinned.
“We’re going into OFSAA the right way,” Booth added.
“We wanted to show we weren’t just the host but we deserved to be there.”
Cam Gushulak, on a set-up from cousin James Gushulak, also scored in the second while Booth had his shutout effort ruined at 13:50 of the third by Matthew Prouty.
“We’ve come a long way from the beginning of the season,” noted Brett Kenny, part of a rookie line with Mikel Ward and Kaden Nelson that won Sinclair’s trust–and more ice time–as the season went on.
“We’re going to be going in as defending champs and the rest of the teams coming will be looking at us as the big guys,” he said.
“Now we have to keep going and win it all.”
Sinclair hopes to have his full lineup available for the start of OFSAA after some bad fortune suffered by Kendyn Faragher.
On his second shift of Tuesday night’s game, the veteran forward tried to get past a Saints’ defender, who pushed his shoulder hard into the boards and wound up dislocating it.
But Faragher–despite his arm in a sling while taking in the post-game celebrations on the ice–sounded optimistic about his return.
“It’s just right on the end,” he motioned toward the injured area before vowing, “I’ll be playing.”
The seedings and schedule for the all-Ontarios will be released in the coming days.
Fort High could get the top seed for the tournament based on its status as defending champ and its strong NorWOSSA record (14-1 during the regular season and 4-0 in the playoffs).
