Dan Falloon
The Red Lake Rams were a pretty good cure for what ailed the Muskie boys’ hockey team late in the regular season.
The black-and-gold easily swept the NorWOSSA semi-final series by scores of 13-2 here on Friday night and then 8-2 in Red Lake on Sunday.
The win moved Fort High into the best-of-three league final against the third-place Dryden Eagles, who swept the second-place Kenora Broncos in their semi-final showdown by scores of 6-2 and 2-1.
Muskie coach Shawn Jourdain doesn’t expect the Eagles to enter the final feeling intimidated given the two teams split the season series 2-2.
“I expect them to be prepared. I don’t think that they’re going to come in here not looking to win,” stressed Jourdain.
“Darryl [Mousseau] is a good coach,” Jourdain added. “He’s going to have them ready and it’s up to us to be prepared for them.”
Fort High had entered the playoffs on a three-game losing streak, including a 5-2 loss to Dryden, but Jourdain feels the added intensity in the playoff games have helped his team start to get back to the needed level of play—even if there’s still a way to go.
“It was a bit of a slow start again,” Jourdain said after Friday night’s win against Red Lake.
“We’re having trouble with that, but we’re moving in the right direction.”
Jourdain also noted the Muskies weren’t at their sharpest off the hop in Sunday’s win, but began to dominate once they started to click.
“Once we got going, we started to put the puck in the net,” he remarked. “Red Lake played a pretty good hockey game, though.”
Jourdain said there still are tweaks that need to be made, but added the main focus will remain on staying the course and following up with an effort that was successful against the fourth-place Rams.
“We’re just going to work on our pace, try to get our pace back up to where it was at the beginning of the year, and shore up our defensive zone a little bit,” he explained.
“We’re just going to keep doing what we’re doing.”
One of the major areas Fort High wanted to improve is scoring the greasy goals from in close, and those ugly tallies came fast and furious against Red Lake.
“We’ve been working on driving the net, being tough in front of the net, because those are the types of things we’d gotten away from,” Jourdain admitted.
The coach also was pleased with the play of Devin Stromness between the pipes, adding the goalies received extra attention leading up to the playoffs.
“Devin played well,” lauded Jourdain. “We’ve been working with our goalies the last few weeks, and it’s sure helped.
“The goalies are enjoying it, just helping them out, and it sure shows with what they’re doing on the ice,” he added.
Colton Spicer got things started in the opening game with a snapper over Rams’ goalie Walker Chagnon.
Devin Ball followed with a power-play wrister before Spicer wired a shot off the crossbar and in to put Fort High up 3-0 after one.
The Muskies extended their lead to 5-0 on goals by Jeff Cridland and Jeff Davis just 31 seconds apart early in the second.
After Red Lake got on the board with a cross-crease tap-in by Casey Anderson, Davis Smith and Cridland put the Muskies up 7-1 before the period was through by tallying 2:43 apart.
The Muskies fired 18 shots at Chagnon in the middle frame to give them a total of 31 after two.
Aaron Pace netted the Rams’ second goal of the night early in the third—dashing out on a breakaway and putting a backhand over Stromness.
But it was all Muskies from then on in as Ball completed the hat trick with a pair in the frame.
Smith, Davis, Nick Jourdain, and Brendan Cawston rounded out the attack against Red Lake goalie Devi Feigl, who came in to start the third period.
Then in Sunday’s clincher, Cawston led the way with a hat trick while Smith added a pair.
Jourdain, Ball, and Dustin Brown added singles to round out the scoring.
The best-of-three NorWOSSA final opens here Friday at 7:30 p.m., with Game 2 on Sunday in Dryden.
Game 3, if necessary, would be played back here Tuesday night (March 9).
The two teams split their regular-season series 2-2, with Fort High capturing the first two by scores of 6-3 and 8-1.
But the Eagles came away with wins of 4-3 (overtime) and 5-2 in the last two.
The Muskies had a number of players watching from the stands entering the Red Lake series, including David Chambers, Donovan Cousineau, and Jacob Witherspoon.
Now defenceman Nathan Calder will join them, having sustained a concussion.
Calder’s loss leaves the Muskies even more shorthanded.
“Right now, we’ll be down to four ‘D’ and it looks like three lines for this weekend [against Dryden],” noted Jourdain.
